


The Last Stand

by fivekrystalpetals



Series: All Roads Lead to...Oriande [2]
Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Acxa Lotor's most trusted general, Acxa and Keith's warrior bond, Allura (Voltron) Lives, Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate ending Voltron Season 7 and Season 8, Black Paladin Keith (Voltron), F/M, Gen, Keith & Allura at constant loggerheads, Keith (Voltron) is a Mess, Keith (Voltron)-centric, Minor Allura/Lance (Voltron), Past Allura/Lotor (Voltron), Shiro (Voltron) Dies, Voltron Season 7 and 8 fix-it
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-08
Updated: 2020-04-03
Packaged: 2021-03-01 04:20:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 15
Words: 32,715
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23039239
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fivekrystalpetals/pseuds/fivekrystalpetals
Summary: "To any beings who receive this message, planet Earth has been overrun by the Galra. Most of the citizens have been captured. Those of us remaining are making our last stand. If you get this message, please get word to Voltron. We need help!"Commander Sendak had an enigmatic smile on his face. "So, they do think Voltron will return."The almost never-ending battle against Sendak and his forces in their attempt to rescue Earth and its citizens as narrated by the Paladins of Voltron.
Relationships: Acxa/Keith (Voltron), Allura & Keith (Voltron), Allura/Lance (Voltron), Allura/Lotor (Voltron), Keith & Black Lion (Voltron), Keith & Keith's Wolf (Voltron), Keith & Krolia (Voltron), Keith & Shiro (Voltron), Keith & The Blade of Marmora, Keith & Voltron Paladins
Series: All Roads Lead to...Oriande [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1613290
Comments: 118
Kudos: 36





	1. Preface

**Author's Note:**

> ****IMPORTANT****  
> I do not consent for my work be hosted by any third party site or app. This piece of fanfiction 'The Last Stand' (in the series 'All Roads Lead to...Oriande') has been posted ONLY in archiveofourown.org under the pseud fivekrystalpetals.
> 
> Please note that this is for purely entertainment purposes, and NOT for any monetary gain. This means that you, as the reader, DO NOT have to pay to read this fanfic.
> 
> Also, this work is strictly my intellectual property. If you find this fanfic on any other app or site or under any other name, in part or in whole, it has been reposted without my permission, so kindly bring it to my notice. Thank you.

I do not own any of the characters mentioned in this piece of fiction, except for a few that I have created as per the story's requirements. Otherwise, all the characters belong to Voltron Legendary Defender and/or Dreamworks (WEP).

The story that I have written here is to be taken purely as an alternate universe ending as far as Season 7 and 8 are concerned. The overall storyline will be based on the canon episodes from these two seasons.

‘The Last Stand’ (Part 2 in the series ‘All Roads Lead to...Oriande’) is the sequel to the ‘The Road to Home’. Many of the canon divergent plot points I had presented there come into play here. So, I request you to read Part 1 before reading this so that you may understand fully and enjoy the story better.

Apart from the disclaimers already presented in the Preface of ‘The Road to Home’, I would like to add two more as follows:

**Atlas doesn’t transform into a big robot...not yet:** Um...okay, to be honest, I really didn’t understand how the ship IGF Atlas (designed and engineered by Commander Holt, by the way) transformed into a giant robot dude just by Shiro concentrating on an Infinite Mass Crystal which was installed in the ship at the last moment while Lotor and Allura went to great lengths for...I mean, I don’t want to turn this into an essay but I hope you get my point. Moreover, the transformed Atlas did near to nothing to help Voltron in their fight against the Robeast.

**Admiral Sanda deserves better:** She is one of the few characters I felt sorry for among all the new ones introduced post Season 6 and the only one killed off for no particular purpose. I totally understand her stand on various matters. For example, she decided against Shiro’s departure (Shiro and Sam Holt were against her decision while Adam was for, which speaks for itself) on the Kereberos Mission because the guy was dead sick. She might be a stickler for rules but she cares about the people around her. I don’t think she would betray them to the Galra commander just when their plan is working out fine. At least, in my alternate universe, she doesn’t.

I have skipped the episodes where Sam Holt builds the IGF Atlas and the MFE fighters, training James Griffin and his team and the first invasion by Sendak (basically, episodes 7 and 8 in Season 7).

Also, this part will have less focus on shipping angles for any of the couples mentioned in the tags. This is going to be about how Voltron defends Earth from Commander Sendak and his fleet. So, I have given only subtle hints so that the romance could be properly built up in the next part.

Anyways, if you are okay with all the above points and continue to read my story, I will be really happier than I can express. And if you like what you are reading, do let me know in the comments. I really treasure all my readers' thoughts. 

Signing off, this is me...truly yours, fivekrystalpetals.

I hope you enjoy reading this part as much as the first, if not more!


	2. Prelude: Arrival

One hyperspace jump was all that their cruiser could manage. Krolia was disappointed. She didn’t want to waste her time in transit when she could have done something much more productive during that time. She stood with her arms folded over her chest, looking out of the window as Acxa manned the ship.

Naturally, her mind started to wander. _What is Keith doing now? Would he have reached Earth? No, they said that they needed one and a half years to complete their journey._ Krolia knew he didn’t want to go to Earth. He had told her that he felt like he had no connection left to that planet now that his dad and Shiro were no more. She felt bad that she never got the chance to meet the real Shiro who had raised Keith from a boy to the gentleman he was today.

She pulled her blade out of her pocket. The indigo light in the hilt shone steadily indicating that Keith was safe, somewhere in the vast universe.

When she left her baby with his father back on Earth, she had hoped against hope that he should not have to face the consequences of the war and that maybe, one day, after the war was all but over, she could return to Earth to live with them. Keith was now the Leader of Voltron, the Paladin of the Black Lion and a seasoned Marmoran agent. She was really proud that he had carved out his own path through life and grown up to be a real hero. But her heart ached with the wish to hold him in her arms as the baby he was twenty decaphoeebs ago.

She knew better than anyone that it was useless lamenting over lost time. She stuffed her blade back into her pocket and drew a deep sigh. _Let’s focus on the mission on hand._

The past movement had yielded no fruit. Kolivan was still sick from his time in captivity by the druid. They had tried to contact a lot of Blade checkpoints en route, but as expected they were all abandoned. _The condition of the Blade of Marmora is worse than I assumed._

Presently, Krolia lifted her eyes to the newest Blade member standing at the helm. She had no idea what to make of her or her actions. She knew that this girl was to end up with her son in the far future if she was to go by one of the rare future visions from the Quantum Abyss. But she was reasonably skeptical.

Princess Allura’s words resonated in her mind. _Unless it is for Haggar, I do not see any reason for you to be searching for us._ There did seem to be a good chance that Acxa was actually acting as a double agent for Haggar. According to her story, the witch had tried to kill her during their confrontation in the Altean colony. _Her story can be easily corroborated once we reach the headquarters. She cannot lie about something like this. But what if Haggar’s attack on her also was part of a bigger plan?_ Krolia shook her head. Her battle instincts were forcing her to think too much into the matter.

The other reason Acxa was working for the Voltron Coalition and the Blades might be because she wanted to find Voltron to save the Universe. For a hardened Galra general like her who had stayed by the Empire for so long, that didn’t seem likely as well.

A small voice spoke in Krolia’s mind. _What if she was actually searching for Keith and not Voltron?_

Within a movement aboard the Black Lion, she had realized that Keith was obliviously in love with Acxa. The way he looked at her reminded Krolia of the day his dad had taken her hand and confessed his love for the first time. _Krolia, if you choose to stay here on Earth with me, I am ready to protect you with my life. Of course, I can’t compel you. If you choose to go, please remember there’d always be me...who continues to cherish your memories till I die._ And she had chosen to stay with him, abandoning the lifetime of war.

She was interrupted from her thoughts when the cruiser stopped abruptly. “Krolia, we are here.”

They had come to a halt before the familiar blue giant caught in the gravitational field of two black holes on either side. _Home._ Her last visit to the Headquarters was two decaphoeebs ago; for the rest of the Blades, it would have been five decaphoeebs.

A message pinged on the console. A female computerized voice spoke up, “Identify yourself.”

“Hailing the Blade of Marmora Headquarters, this is Krolia. Accompanying me aboard the Galra cruiser Graz-723X are Acxa and Kolivan. Headcount complete for three.”

There was a pause for five ticks and then it beeped again. “Initiating identification protocol. Please enter your security code.”

Acxa turned to her. “Security code?”

“Nothing but a scan of your blade. Your blade is your identity inside any of the Blade bases.” Krolia held up her blade to the virtual scanner that had appeared on the screen. “The quintessence connected to each blade is an energy signal that can be converted into readable data and verified for identity.”

“Identification protocol completed. Please proceed.”

Krolia downloaded the data relayed to their cruiser from the Base. “Acxa, they have sent us the safest route to the base. It will be open only for one varga. Guide us in carefully. Keep sharp.”

As she maneuvered them in, Krolia could only hope that Acxa would reciprocate the love Keith had for her. She wanted to protect her baby son’s heart from being broken for this was the first time he had fallen in love with someone.

Of course, some experiences were supposed to be earned the hard way.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you are wondering about the timeline, it is something like this: Acxa, Krolia and Keith were together aboard the Black Lion for four months. After the fight with Macidus, they parted ways and took them a week and give or take a half to reach the Blade headquarters whereas for Voltron, it took one more month to reach Earth (you know, via the nebula, shortening the actual travel time from eighteen months to five months)


	3. Arrival

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The timestamp mentioned above each section may not add up properly (I am not good at math...Math is for Pidge!) but yeah, I have tried my best. The style of writing from this chapter onward is different if you notice. 
> 
> Anyways, I hope you like this chapter!!

**DAY 1**

**2000 hours: Voltron**

Voltron was within the edge of the Solar System but the communication to Earth seemed to be completely cut off. Pidge remembered the crude makeshift communicator she had built to scan till Kerberos in her search for her dad and Matt. Even after she found them, she hadn’t been able to have a quiet moment with them. _Dad left for Earth, Matt for the rebels. And now, again, I can’t get in touch with either of them. Dad, where are you?!_

She impatiently clicked on the Green Lion’s transmitter again. “Galaxy Garrison, please respond. Voltron is coming. Dad, are you there?”

They were nearing Neptune’s orbit when a familiar voice crackled through the comm. “Katie? Katie, is that you?”

Her heart soared. _Dad!_ “Dad, it’s me. I’m here.”

“Katie, I am so glad to hear your voice. Where are you?”

“We are within the Earth’s solar system,” she replied excitedly, imagining how happy he would be to hear her after three years. _Oh my gosh! Mom and Dad must have thought I am dead._ “Heading to Earth now.”

But, her dad’s voice quivered more with fear than excitement. “Wait, you must stop!”

Keith increased the volume of the transmission. “What? Say it again.”

“Stop.” Her dad repeated. “Sendak has invaded the planet. He’s taken over Earth. If he finds out that Voltron is here, he’ll threaten the people of Earth in exchange for the Lions.”

_A momentary pause...Keith is deciding what to do._ Uranus had already flitted past them when he shouted his command. “Reverse thrusters!”

Hunk and Allura immediately pushed forward their controls to stop Voltron from moving any further. But the damage was done.

“Uh-oh, we’ve been spotted.”

**2008 hours: Galaxy Garrison**

Commander Holt watched the Galra troops’ mobilization around Saturn on the monitor screen. He turned to Veronica and Curtis, who were at the panel. “Pick up those Galra ships locations. We need to scramble any transmissions immediately.”

His subordinates rapidly obeyed his orders. “Scanning location.”

“Triangulating position for broadcast, sir.”

“Sending interference. Interference complete.”

Sam Holt called out to his daughter. “Paladins, we have blocked the patrol’s transmission. You are clear.”

**2009 hours: Voltron**

Lance straight away jumped into action. **“** Roger that. Let’s take ‘em out.”

Three of the four Galra ships were instantly destroyed by the laser shots from the Red Lion when Pidge had a sudden idea. “Wait, don’t destroy that ship. We might need it.”

“Really? For what?”

“We can’t fly our Lions to Earth without being spotted, so we’ll leave them on Saturn’s moon which should keep them hidden from Sendak’s radars. We’ll fly in the Galra ship to Earth.”

Hunk’s face popped up on the screen. “How about we all travel in your Lion? We can hide ourselves by the cloaking mechanism.”

“Or how about we cloak the whole of Voltron like the way we did the other day?”

Keith broke in incredulously. “You cloaked Voltron itself?! How? When?”

Lance was about to explain but Pidge cut him off. “Guys, we don’t have time for all that. I think the interference from the Garrison will last only for a few minutes. Plus, no...Earth is heavily surrounded by Galra. Cloaking is too risky now.”

Lance pushed his Lion forward to grab hold of the ship. “Copy that. Okay, so who gets to fly this ship?”

**2016 hours: Voltron**

_Keith, duh!_ Pidge murmured as she sat sandwiched between Allura and Hunk and Kosmo’s snout and Allura’s mice in her lap. They huddled in the tiny cargo bay of the ship while Keith silently maneuvered it from right under the noses of the Galra forces invading Earth.

Keith yelled his warning even as Pidge felt the descent herself. “Hang on! We are entering Earth’s atmosphere.”

How many ever planets she had visited throughout her space adventures, Pidge never came across a planet with such a thick atmosphere like that of Earth. _One of the many beautiful things about our home planet. I can’t believe we’re finally here!_ Hunk put her thoughts into words. “This is weird...almost exactly how we left Earth, crammed in the cockpit of the Blue Lion.”

Presently, the front of their ship caught fire. _We are gonna go down like a shooting star._ Even Keith couldn’t keep up. “We are overweight. I’m losing altitude! Brace for impact!”

And then, darkness hit.

**2040 hours: Voltron**

The ruins on Earth were far worse than the ones they encountered on the planet where Macidus the druid had set up his home. Pidge looked around to see nothing but abandoned homes, wrecked cars and broken roads everywhere.

Hunk frowned in thought. “Hey, I know this place. I’ve been here. This is Plaht city. It’s about a half an hour from the Garrison.”

“Whoa, I can’t believe this is all that’s left of it.”

Keith pulled out his Bayard. “We need to get to the Garrison. Stay together. Let’s move quick and quiet.”

As they walked along, Pidge wondered whether her dad would send them some pickup to help them reach the Garrison. _If the condition of a city this close to the Garrison is this...I guess no?_

She walked behind Keith, her Bayard in her hand and watching the arm monitor for any incoming Galra hostiles. Suddenly, it started to beep. Before she could process what was happening, the patrol drones had spotted them from high above. “Take cover!”

The drones mercilessly shot at them in every direction. They hid behind a car while Hunk and Lance tried to shoot them down. “Guys, there are four of these drones.”

“Good. I’ll distract them.” Keith jumped out into the open. “Lance, you take the shot.”

Pidge had to grudgingly acknowledge Lance’s sharpshooting skills. _Four shots, four drones down. Not bad!_

They emerged from their hiding places to gather around Keith who crushed the remains of the drone under his foot. “Wonder how many of these things they have around here. Pidge, any chance we could see these things before they get to us?”

_Already on it._ “Looks like there are four more headed our way.”

Well, the drones weren’t headed on their way. They had already started shooting.

**2050 hours: Voltron**

They jumped behind the wreckage of vehicles to take cover. Lance threw a piece of the debris at the attackers. “They are not drones. Look!”

_True, they are robots armed with blasters. Why can’t the Galra just program these sentries with cool ‘Fun’ program modules? I miss my friendly robo dude from the Central Command. Where would he be now?_

Too late, Pidge realized she was distracted by her thoughts and forgot about the battle going on around her. She didn’t notice another set of drones approaching her from behind.

“Pidge!” Hunk shouted. “Look out!”

She turned about to have a drone blasting a shot right in her face. Her instincts kicking in, she raised her shield in time. Lance managed to shoot it down from where he was. But now, Hunk, who had come out of his hiding place to save her, found himself locked onto by a sentry.

Out of nowhere, the sentry got ripped away by an incoming Space Rover. The driver, a guy in a Garrison armored suit, destroyed the robot before it could rise again. Soon, another Rover came by. A girl in a similar uniform jumped down from it and aimed her gun at a drone. “Stay down, we got this.”

Between them, they took down all the remaining hostiles. Keith was annoyed by the unasked help. “We had it!”

“Drones send distress signals when they are attacked,” the new guy replied. “Our weapons neutralize those signals. So unless you wanna deal with a swarm of those things, let us handle it. Now let’s get out of here before more show up.”

Pidge instantly disliked him and his attitude. Her three boys stared at the new guy and looked at each other like they couldn’t believe they were hearing this. _Do they all know each other?_

**2120 hours: Galaxy Garrison**

Galaxy Garrison was remarkably different from the last time Pidge saw it. Starting from the particle barrier her dad had erected around it. However, all those details she noticed only later. Right now, she couldn’t divert her attention from the group of people standing at the gate to receive them. Her eyes frantically searched for her mom and dad in the group as they moved closer and closer to them. Before their pickup had even properly pulled up in front of the gates, Pidge was out of it, right into her mom’s waiting arms. _Mom! I am here!_

**2122 hours: Galaxy Garrison**

Commander Holt looked at his daughter and wife crying and hugging each other as if to never let go. Bebe was running around the two of them, her tail wagging out of excitement to see her baby sister again. Sam Holt gulped down the strong emotions bubbling up in his throat. _Wish Matt was here, too. Then our family will be complete._

He smiled seeing Lance getting bundled upon by his large family. He remembered how his sister Veronica had singlehandedly brought together the troops of rebel forces and found her family in the process. _Brother and sister are similar in so many ways really._

He turned to look at the others. Keith helped the princess to get down from the Rover, and another Altean he hadn’t met before. Coran was talking to Commander Iverson. Sam Holt was glad that they were getting along well. But the most intriguing of all was the glowy space dog (or wolf?) cuddled at Keith’s foot as he cordially shook hands with Iverson.

Commander Holt had never met him personally during his days aboard the Castle of Lions. From what he had heard, Keith apparently had some miniscule Galra roots which made him suitable for the Blade of Marmora and hence, left Voltron to go there. _Why in the world would he abandon Voltron and his friends from Earth to join an alien group, on top of that Galra?_

Just then, he noticed Hunk standing forlornly in one corner with a sad smile on his face. Sam walked up to him. “It is good to have you back, Hunk.”

He nodded glumly. “So, my family?”

Sam closed his eyes and shook his head. “We will find them soon. I promise.”

**2145 hours: Galaxy Garrison**

Keith followed his guide to his assigned quarters within the Garrison premises. His guide was none other than Lance’s sister, Veronica. He couldn’t help noticing how much brother and sister looked alike. _Except her eyes are lighter shades of blue._

Commander Holt had taken one look at all the Paladins and decided that they needed their dearly needed sleep after all their space adventures. “We will have a debriefing tomorrow 0600 hours sharp. Right now, you need to rest.” Maybe, Mom and Dad wanted to spend some time with Pidge. Whatever the case, Keith was grateful for the break.

After Veronica had said her goodbyes, he grabbed a towel and walked to the washroom. _A steaming hot shower and then, I’d be as good as new._

**2200 hours: Galaxy Garrison**

Keith stretched out on his bunk in his room, the detachable tablet from his uniform in his hand. The bunk was not as comfortable as the one in the Castle of Lions, but definitely better than the one in the Blade Headquarters. He wondered what his mom and Kolivan were doing. _Would they have reached the Main Base by now? Why didn’t Acxa contact me even once during the past month as she promised?_

He was looking through the many photos they had taken during the four months of travel aboard the Black Lion when suddenly the tablet started to beep. _What now?_ He carelessly swiped right the incoming message to open it. Only, it wasn’t a message. It was a video call from space by a pair of gorgeous indigo eyes he had missed so sorely.

He hastily sat up fumbling with his tablet, almost dropped it twice and planted his feet right into Kosmo who was curled up on the floor. Kosmo whined in complaint and jumped onto his bunk. _Sorry, buddy!_

“Oh, hi...uh, hi Acxa!” He raised his hand in greeting but he wasn’t sure if she could see. “I wasn’t expecting...”

“I wasn’t expecting...”

Both of them paused at what the other said. _Okay, this is awkward._ “You weren’t expecting... _me_?”

“Uh, no.” She turned a little purple. “I wasn’t expecting you to pick up. I mean, Krolia and I had been trying for quintants now, to contact you. But to no avail. Where have you been? Are you okay?”

“I am good, for now.” He got up from his bunk to pace around the room. “We were passing through some...very turbulent areas, you could say. Maybe, that’s why you couldn’t contact me. What about you guys?”

“We reached the Headquarters around twenty quintants ago. There is a lot I need to elaborate on that, but not via this transmission.” She took a deep breath. “Keith, you need to hurry on your journey. We have received intel that planet Earth is under attack.”

“By Sendak?”

“Oh.” She raised her brow. “You heard already?”

“Yeah, well, we arrived on Earth today. We barely escaped the eyes of his patrol as we were landing. He has assembled a huge faction from what I see.”

“The Fire of Purification, his faction is called. He wants to wipe clean all those who are not pure Galra.”

Keith thought about it. _That would include half breeds like Acxa and me. Where does Earth come in this? Hmm, he must have calculated that we would return to Earth. And that, he could snatch Voltron from us._

Acxa’s soft voice shook him from his thoughts. “You are already on Earth? How? I thought you needed one and a half decaphoeebs travel time.”

“Yeah, we had some help.”

“I see.” She looked like she wanted to pry further but stopped herself.

Keith sat down on his bunk. His wolf brought his snout to the tablet to sniff Acxa a hello. She smiled at the sight of him. “Where is Krolia?”

“She is in a meeting with Kolivan and Syra. I was told that I was not required there as it is only for senior members.”

Keith grinned. “In other words, you were kicked out?”

She narrowed her eyes for one of her classic death glares which felt more comic to him now than intimidating. “By the way, I don’t know when I might be able to contact you again after today,” she continued. “Merla and I are going for a cloaked flyby to planet Oriande.”

His eyes widened in shock. “What? The planet you suspect Honerva to be? You are going all alone there?”

“We won’t be facing her directly. Just cautiously collecting intel. It is necessary, Keith. Someone has to keep an eye on the witch’s plans. Right now, Voltron needs to protect Earth, isn’t it?”

“Yeah, but...” Keith trailed off. “This is too dangerous, Acxa. I’m--” _She isn’t gonna listen to me if I say no._ “Be careful, will you?”

“Don’t worry. You are talking to the best pilot the Galra have to offer.”

He scoffed in disbelief. “I can challenge to that.”

She smiled again and bid him goodbye. As he fluffed his pillow, Keith realized his sleep had deserted him. The next few hours were just him tossing and turning on his bed, partly from the excitement of having got a chance to talk to Acxa, but more from the apprehension of something on her mission going horribly wrong. 


	4. Know Your Enemy

**DAY 2**

**0300 hours: Galaxy Garrison**

_Mom is baking a mango cream cake. We are having a tea party outside. The blue sky, the warm sunlight and the cool breeze - the perfect outdoor conditions. Meg is teasing Frank about his shirt. Mom and Dad are laughing. Little Lisa is giggling at my stupid jokes._

Hunk wasn’t sure whether he was dreaming or reliving his memories of his family. _My eyes are wide open. Surely, I can’t be dreaming with my eyes open._ Finally he gave up trying to sleep. He sighed and got up from his bunk to make himself a glass of honey milk. 

**0305 hours: Galaxy Garrison**

Keith lay on his bunk, gazing at his wolf as the latter snored his night away. He rolled his eyes. _Must be nice to sleep without a worry about tomorrow._ He sat up and decided to get a glass of water. _Drinking water might help me clear my head a bit. But, seriously, why does she have to...Ugh, just stop!_ Rubbing his temple with his fingers, he stepped out of his room.

He was about to turn into the pantry room when he heard a loud crash in the kitchen. He rushed in there to find Hunk vigorously rubbing his face with a towel. “Is everything okay in here?”

“Yeah...?” Keith knew him well enough by now to tell that his unenthusiastic _yeah_ meant he was not okay. He had noticed him standing all alone in a corner while Lance and Pidge were being warmly welcomed by their family. _That is why he is sad. What should I say now? How should I console him? Should I promise him that we will find his family? Gosh, I suck at this._

Keith cleared his throat. _Here goes nothing._ “Look, I know I am not really good at talking with people, and I-I don’t expect you to open up to me, but...if there is anything on your mind--”

“This situation stinks!” Hunk broke in hotly. He rolled up his towel and threw it in the sink. “I can’t believe we finally get to Earth and it’s taken over by the _Galra_.”

Keith walked in to stand beside him. “So, I guess there is something on your mind.”

“I know this is stupid but I used to daydream about coming home to a peaceful Earth. And that would've been great. But I realized that nothing...nothing would have been greater than seeing my family.”

His face contorted as though he was going to cry. He closed his eyes and gulped down hard. Keith felt sorry for him. He wanted to say something to console him but couldn’t find the right words. Hunk continued, “But I can't. And all I keep thinking about is that I wasn't there for them. And I don't even know if they're okay. And I see Pidge and Lance with their families, and--” He took a deep breath. “I mean, I'm happy for them. I am. But it just...it makes me miss my family more. I--I just...I've never felt so alone and scared.”

Keith patted his shoulder gently. “Look, Hunk, I never told you this, but of all the Paladins, you're the one I'm most impressed by. It's no secret that you've been the most scared, but you never backed down. Never. And to be brave is to go on in spite of fear. That's who you are, Hunk. I know you're scared, but your family...they need you to be strong right now.”

Apparently, what he thought was pointless rambling on his part actually acted like a pep talk for Hunk. He stared at Keith for a second and then, squeezed him into a tight hug. _Hunk, my ribs!_ Somehow, he wrapped his hands around his big torso and squeaked, “Okay. All right. Now we're huggin'.”

Hunk released him enough for him to catch his breath. “Thank you, Keith.”

He was confused when Hunk started to walk out of the kitchen. “Whu--Wait, where are you going?”

He turned on his heels at the door, a grim determination in his eyes. “I'm going to get my family.”

Keith smiled, ready for the late night adventure. “Not without me.”

**0330 hours: Galaxy Garrison**

They donned their Paladin armor as quickly as they could and sneaked into the bay where the Space Rovers were stored. They were just about to climb into one when they got caught in a glaring spotlight. Startled, Keith turned to...scowl in annoyance. _James Griffin. What is this guy doing out here?_

“You two heading somewhere?” _Has he always been this overdramatic? Dude, what is it with the bad spotlight effect?_ Keith would have punched his guts as he did five years back had he not noticed Veronica standing on the ground. He sighed in resignation. “This doesn't concern either of you.”

Veronica shrugged lightly. “No, but you'll probably be concerned with the patrol drones that will spot you within seconds.”

Griffin jumped down from his perch on top of the vehicle. “And you might be concerned with the blast from Sendak's automated low-orbit, long-range blaster satellite that takes you out.”

_Ah, just shut your...we’ve already seen all that in loads._ Hunk was understandably frustrated. “What's your problem?!”

“My problem is that I don't wanna see our only hope for saving Earth get hurt.” Griffin spread his arms like he wanted a group hug. “That's why we're coming with you.”

Keith and Hunk looked at each other. _Well, that was unexpected._

**0415 hours: Outskirts of Plaht City**

As they crouched beneath a low wall, out of sight of the patrol sentries, James told them that there were small underground pockets of resistance against Sendak. “Veronica is sending the signal that we are here, to the leader of one of these rebel groups. Hopefully, he has some information about your parents, Hunk.”

Presently, Veronica joined them in their hiding place. “Signal sent. We should hear from him soon.”

Two rounds of patrol passed. Hunk was growing impatient. Suddenly, a long shadow fell on their hiding place. _A human in his early fifties?_

“Come with me. Quickly.”

**0425 hours: Outskirts of Plaht City**

The man brought them to a secret room atop one of the ruined buildings in Plaht City. The lone bench in the room was lit by an overhead lamp. The table and walls were completely covered in hand-drawn maps, drawing instruments and makeshift devices.

He opened the window to let in the cold night air. “Amazing, the rumors are true. Word of the Paladin’s return has inspired the resistance.”

Hunk smiled. “Thank you for your help. Tell the resistance that we’re gonna get rid of the Galra.”

“Words we’ve waited a long time to hear.”

Veronica leaned out of the window. “Is this where they have taken all the prisoners?”

Hunk and Keith joined Veronica by the window. _Looks like some mining is going on down there. What are they mining for?_ “What are they doing down there?”

“They have work camps operating day and night, mining ore for Sendak,” the rebel leader answered. “It's been nonstop for months. He's building something, but no one is sure what.”

Hunk glanced at Keith. _This can’t be anything good. We need to find out more about this._ He nodded and turned to the window. “What about the labor forces?”

“Till recently, they were outside the encampment. But now, they have been moved in.”

“What does that mean?”

Veronica shook her head sadly. “That means we can’t get you to your parents.”

Hunk felt like breaking down in tears again. _No. Please, no. This is so close._ “Believe me,” Veronica continued. “If there was a way, we would do it.”

He took the magnifying goggles from James. “Can I at least see them from here?”

**0445 hours: Outskirts of Plaht City**

Keith tapped his shoulder. “Hunk, I see movement. I think the shift is over. The workers are exiting.”

Through his goggles, Hunk desperately searched for his parents. There were tens of human workers who were being ordered by the Galra sentries to their living quarters. Suddenly, he saw a familiar mop of curly black hair tied back by a bandana. _Mom!_ The sentry shoved her roughly out of the way. She staggered and would have fallen down if not for a muscular man who supported her and glared at the sentry. _Dad! No...!_

Tears freely flowed down his cheeks. It was bad enough that he couldn’t meet his parents and carry them off to safety. To see them work day and night for the Galra...Hunk felt miserable. “Mom, Dad, you just need to hang on a little longer. We’re gonna get you out. I’m going to get you out.”

**0600 hours: Galaxy Garrison**

The battle against Lotor was less unnerving than the debriefing with Galaxy Garrison. _Would they even listen to a Garrison dropout like me? Ah, how I wish Shiro was here..._

Admiral Sanda chaired the debriefing at the head of the conference table. The top Garrison commanders, seated opposite to Keith, were staring intently at him. He put his interlaced fingers on the table in front of him, trying to look as confident as possible. _My whole team is sitting right next to me. I am gonna be okay._

“Sendak’s forces remain at bay,” Commander Holt was saying. “But without a meaningful supply line, we’re slowly getting suffocated. This is the last place on Earth that is relatively well defended. But this is not going to last long. We need to figure out Sendak’s plans as soon as possible.”

Hunk sat up in his chair. "Any idea as to what Sendak is building?”

Veronica pulled up the map of the globe on the screen, six dots pinging in every continent except Antarctica. “Based on data from Commander Holt’s microsatellites, cross-referenced with the resistance intel, we’ve ascertained that Sendak has built six massive structures on Earth. However, we don’t have a clue about them or a method to gather more intel.”

“The Paladins can infiltrate one of these structures to--” Keith started to speak, but Admiral Sanda cut him off. “I don’t understand, Commander Holt. Why do we need to figure out Sendak’s plan when it is already as clear as day? He has attacked Earth because he wants the Lions. Now, the Lions are here. It seems that we need to at least discuss our options in this regard.”

Keith couldn’t believe what he was hearing. “Are you saying that we willingly hand over the Lions to Sendak?” _Woah, are you nuts?_

Admiral Sanda frowned as if she didn’t want to answer him. “You heard Commander Holt. Our supplies are gone. On the insistence of Commander Holt, we used up all our resources in building a ship that doesn’t fly. The weapons we do have are not enough to mount an attack. All we can do is protect a small pocket of Earth. But, for how much longer?”

“And your solution is to hand over the Lions of Voltron to the vile Galra and trust that they will leave you and your people alone?” Allura asked incredulously. “Believe me when I say, Sendak has been Zarkon’s right hand for the longest time. If I read his motives right, he will capture the Lions and destroy Earth anyways. There is no bargaining with the Galra.”

Admiral Sanda obviously didn’t like Allura’s remarks. “Maybe, you should leave the matters of Earth to the people who live here.”

Keith stood up from his seat, trying to check the situation. “Please, Admiral. I respect that you'll do anything you can to protect Earth. But trust us, we've been through more than you could ever imagine. We have fought the Galra on the fringes of the universe and in their very home. There must be a way to defeat Sendak.”

“How? How do you plan to defeat Sendak and his entire fleet?”

Keith didn’t know what to say. He knew Voltron can defeat Sendak and his likes, but he didn’t have a proper military plan as such. Coran saved him from the embarrassment. “What of the ship? You say it doesn’t fly?”

“Yes, the battleship is built and ready,” Commander Holt answered. “Unfortunately, I am unable to recreate the power of a Balmeran crystal and so, it cannot fly. Maybe, you can help us out with this?”

Keith silently thanked Coran with his eyes. “Yes, how about all of us head to the hangar to take a look at the new ship that is to act as the replacement for the Castle of Lions?”

**0645 hours: Galaxy Garrison**

Keith was impressed. Within a span of one year or so, Sam Holt had managed to integrate Altean technology with Earth weaponry and come up with more powerful ships than ever built on Earth before.

Four smaller ships were parked to one side, which Commander Holt called Mecha-Flex-Exo fighters, or MFEs. James Griffin and his team were the MFE pilots. “The MFEs are extremely agile and have very advanced weaponry unlike any of the other fighters built by the Garrison before. But they are only capable of short-range attacks. Sustaining power with Altean infused technology is an issue we’re trying to overcome.”

Coran twirled his moustache. “Hmm, maybe I can help you out with that. I have some leftover Faunatonium. It is an Altean fuel additive, but also has some unexpected side effects. So, don’t get any on you!”

Sam Holt blinked as though he didn’t know what to do with that information. Next, he led them to the gigantic battleship that stood in the middle of the hangar. “This is IGF-Atlas, our battleship. It is large enough to house all of the Lions and an entire command unit. But as I told you, we are missing a crystal for powering the ship.”

Even Coran looked impressed by the sheer size of the Atlas. “Not one. A ship like this might need two or three battleship class Balmeran crystals.”

“I suppose there are no Balmeras nearby?”

“In this young galaxy?!” Coran doubled over laughing. “Oh, yeah, it's right next to the Wizblattle. That's a no. No Balmeras around here.”

Admiral Sanda folded her arms. “In that case, I suppose we are back to square one? Without the crystal you speak of, this ship is useless and all our resources have been wasted. In addition, we don’t have any idea what we are up against.”

“Maybe we do,” Allura turned to Commander Holt. “The information you downloaded from the Castle of Lions contains Sendak’s memories. That might give us some insight into Sendak’s plans.”

Commander Holt looked at the Admiral. “Admiral, we just need some time.”

She narrowed her eyes, but said nothing.

**0720 hours: Galaxy Garrison**

It felt like a downgrade for Pidge to work with the crude Earth technology after having worked with the Altean and Galra tech for so long. Commander Sablan, who had accompanied them to the server room, informed her that processing the massive amount of complex Altean data had taken every node they had. “Sifting through so much data is like finding a needle in a haystack.”

Pidge smirked. _Challenging yes, impossible no. And I love a good challenge._ “Then, let’s get started.” 

**1345 hours: Galaxy Garrison**

“Whoa!” One of Pidge’s greatest dreams was to make her dad flabbergasted by something she had created. One look at his face and she knew she had succeeded in that to some extent. “Amazing!”

Allura, Hunk and Pidge had spent the entire morning in recreating Sendak’s memories the same way the Castle of Lions had interacted with King Alfor’s memories. After hours of hard work, finally a shimmering hologram of Sendak stood in front of them. “Dad, test it out. Ask him a question.”

“Um, all right. What is your name?”

The result was better than she expected. “I am Commander Sendak, a royal officer to the Galra Empire.”

“Okay, where are you from?”

“I am proud to say I was born with unquestionable Galra lineage.”

Keith took the next shot. “Commander, explain to me your methods for conquering planets.”

“There are as many ways to conquer a planet as there are planets themselves. Primitive species are the easiest. It usually doesn't take more than one or two waves of attack to bring them to their knees.”

Allura inquired, “What about more advanced civilizations?”

“There are always those willing to sacrifice themselves for the greater good. That's why it is best to find something they value more than themselves and make that the target.”

“What do you mean?”

“Citizens of advanced civilizations have the weakness of caring for each other.”

Hunk raised his hand. “A military operation on such a large scale...won’t it take immense time and resources?”

“Our operations rely on the resources of the planet. They become our supplies and feed our occupation.”

“Have you ever failed in overtaking a planet?”

“Tenacity and time conquer all foes.”

Allura seemed really stressed now. “What if a planet refuses to give up, no matter the cost?”

“Then we annihilate it. But only one planet has ever refused. _Altea_.”


	5. Revelations, Part - I

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The last chapter and this one is based more or less on what was presented in the show, I know, for there weren't many changes that were required. I absolutely love the part where Keith, Pidge and Kosmo go on an adventure together.  
> I hope you enjoy reading!

**DAY 2**

**1500 hours: Galaxy Garrison**

Pidge stood at the head of the conference table for another meeting with the Garrison officials post Sendak’s memory decryption. “We've learned so much from Sendak's memories. We discovered his methods for taking over planets like Earth.”

Allura nodded and walked up to stand beside her. “Sendak constructs armaments at key strategic points around planets. This gives him the ability to control enormous swaths of territory. He uses the armaments as deterrents to prevent any uprisings and to control the conquered population.”

When Veronica pulled up the map with the six pinging dots across the continents, Keith realized what they were. _Sendak’s armaments._ Lance put his thoughts into words. “They are the weapons? So, what’s stopping us from blowing them up?”

“We simply don’t have enough firepower to do the job,” Admiral Sanda replied. She didn’t seem as frustrated as she had been a few hours ago. _Perhaps, she is really impressed by our work._ Still, Keith couldn’t decide if she was entirely willing to work with Team Voltron now, or not. “And even if we did, there is a good chance that those facilities contain civilians. We can’t just rush in blind.”

Keith had to agree with her. “Admiral Sanda is right. That is why we should infiltrate the base and gather intelligence first. Veronica, where is the nearest base?”

She quickly tapped her tablet twice to pull up an enlarged image of a huge building, distinctly Galran in design. “The nearest base, which we call Base One, is fifty-two klicks south of our position. It is a complex urban environment. The route will take us through highly patrolled areas.” She drew up a rough sketch of the area on the screen and marked the route they were supposed to take. “As you can see, it will be hard to keep proper surveillance of our surroundings due to all the structural damage.”

Admiral Sanda tapped her chin with her finger thoughtfully. “Then I suggest that we form two teams, a ground unit that will attempt to infiltrate Base One and get eyes on whatever's inside, and a sniper team that observes from a higher position so as to cover the ground unit and provide some visibility. The Voltron team can be the ground unit and the MFEs, sniper support.”

Hearing her answer, Keith drew a long, exultant breath. _Finally! Now, Keith, you are treading on delicate grounds. Use your nonexistent diplomacy properly._ “Admiral Sanda, if I may, how about we take a mix of the Paladins and the MFEs? For example, Lance is more experienced in sniper support whereas Pidge would be able to download the intel from the Base.”

So, it was decided. Lance, Hunk, Veronica and Ryan Kinkade for the sniper unit. Allura, Pidge, James and himself for the infiltration team. Plus, Kosmo, who didn’t want to be left behind.

**1622 hours: Base One**

“Approaching target location.” Keith rode shotgun as James drove them through the rough terrain. Pidge and Allura sat in the backseat. Kosmo took up all the remaining space in the Rover.

Veronica’s voice came through. “Copy that, Ground Unit. We’ve got eyes on you.”

Admiral Sanda’s idea actually proved to be effective. The area near the Base was an intricate mesh of tunnels, sewer lines, slippery footholds and regular intervals of patrol drones. The sniper team, or more specifically Lance, guided them through so that they could move easily without getting caught by the drones at every turn. Keith was reminded of the invisible maze at the Castle of Lions where they had been in the same scenario. Only their roles were reversed. _Lance seems to be better at dictating instructions than following them. Good thing I assigned him to the sniper team._

**1630 hours: Base One**

The four of them finally reached the entrance of the Base guarded by a dozen sentries. “This is as close as we’re gonna get.” Keith turned to his companions. “Pidge and I are going in. You both hold fort here.”

Griffin shook his head. “Negative. Route’s obstructed. It’s too well guarded.”

Naturally, Keith ignored his expert opinion. “Lance, you ready to cover us when we get inside?”

“Ready to go.”

Keith and Pidge kept their hands on his wolf. _Let’s go, buddy!_ The three of them disappeared in a cloud of glitter.

**1631 hours: Base One**

They appeared in the middle of a corridor with the typical Galra purple lighting. Immediately, they hid behind a large column. “We need to find a port where I can hack in,” Pidge whispered. “A control panel or a substation.”

“Got it.”

They ran along the length of the corridor. Lance continued to give them the directions. “Scanning for hostiles. Sentries on the other side of the east wall.”

Keith spotted two of the mentioned sentries, with guns in their hands. _Kosmo, now!_ Just as they turned in their direction, Kosmo teleported. Keith and Pidge landed on the other end of the corridor. “Lance?”

“All clear.”

Pidge opened up the hall door and they rushed in. The end of the hall was a two-way forked tunnel with a short wall at the beginning. They crouched down near the wall. “Lance, now what?”

“You guys are gonna have to take the right tunnel. But wait...there are sentries approaching from both the tunnels. Hold position.”

Keith was ready with his sword just in case their position got busted. “Coming up to you in...”

“Three.” _Three._

"Two.” _Two._

“One.” _One. Now!_

Kosmo teleported them into the right tunnel. Keith watched as the sentries marched away, unaware of the intruders. _Good job, Kosmo!_

**1640 hours: Base One**

Lance was so focused on guiding his friends through the maze-like Base that he almost didn’t hear Ryan’s question. “That thing picks up heat signature?”

 _What thing? Oh, the rifle?_ “Actually, no. It locks on to their suits’ sonar imaging and renders a 3D map within a 20 foot perimeter. It’s cool Paladin stuff.”

Veronica, who had accompanied him despite his warning about the dangers of the mission ( _And I’m still very angry about that!)_ , interrupted their conversation. “Got movement to the north. Drones closing in from the adjacent alley.” 

Lance watched through his magnifying eyepiece as Allura and Griffin crouched further down in their hiding place. But one of the drones beeped, apparently having caught onto their presence. “Lance, we have been spotted.”

“Hang tight!”

He always prided on his perfectly reliable sharpshooting skills, and that didn’t fail today. He shot down the drone and three others with it, just in time before it started shooting at Allura.

“Man, the drones would have sent the distress signals to the robot sentries!”

 _Oh, quiznack. Forgot about that._ But, the sentries didn’t. Veronica reported the status. “I’ve got five hostiles.”

“Lance, you take the three on the right,” Ryan advised. “I’ll take the two on the left.”

“Copy that.”

**1642 hours: Base One**

Keith and his wolf knelt beside the right column near the door and Pidge beside the left. _The sentries are guarding the main door. Then, this must be the central communications hub._

Pidge apparently had some idea how to get past the guards. She made a lot of wild gestures for him to understand. He understood nothing, but gave her the thumbs-up anyways. _Come on, buddy. Gotta improvise. Get me on the other side of the main door. I’ll open it up for Pidge._

_Yup, boss._

He rolled his eyes. _Dude, I told you not to call me that!_

 _Whatever, boss._ Kosmo snickered lightly. _Not opening the door? We are here._

Keith put his palm on the palm scanner. When the door opened, he found the sentries ceaselessly shooting at a hologram of Pidge. _Hologram or real, you don’t hurt my friend._ He hacked down the robots from behind. When Pidge ran inside the room laughing maniacally, he wondered if he had done the right thing.

**1643 hours: Base One**

All the sentries were down. Allura got up from her position to check for any more hostiles. He zoomed in to have a better look at her face. _How can she be so beautiful yet so intimidating?_ The sensible part of his brain warned him. _Lance, you are getting distracted during a dangerous mission. Focus!_

Somehow, she realized he was staring at her. She gave him a tiny smile. “Thank you, Lance.” _And, that...is how I roll up my focus and throw it into the--_

“She is pretty.” Lance jumped. His sister had been watching Allura’s zoomed face all the while.

“I-I wasn’t looking at her. I was zooming for the...hostiles. She was the one who walked into the vision of the eyepiece.”

Veronica gave him a sly smile. “I never said anything.”

He was about to protest when Allura’s distressed voice came in through the comm. “Lance, Kinkade, more sentries incoming.”

**1644 hours: Base One**

“I am in. Downloading intel.”

The trio stood on the island where the main computer was placed. While Pidge was downloading the data, Keith looked at the massive structure in front of them. “What...is this?”

Her gauntlet beeped, indicating the download was complete. She gasped in shock. “It’s a Zaiforge cannon.”

“What?!” _Impossible!_

Her voice quivered as she made the connection. “Each base must be building one. So, this was Sendak’s plan all along. To annihilate Earth as we had refused to yield to him.”

**1645 hours: Base One**

Lance and Kinkade shot down as many hostiles as they could, but more just kept coming. Two of the sentries climbed up the stairs to reach their floor. Hunk blasted them using his Bayard. “Cover is definitely blown, guys,” he observed. “Gotta get out of here.”

Lance called out to his teammates. “Keith, Pidge, it’s time to roll.”

“Copy that.”

“Veronica, detonate the chaff. Now!”

Large explosions went off in all the adjacent alleys. Their plan was a success. The explosion caused interference in the visions of the sentries as well as the drones that bought them enough time to rendezvous to their vehicles. _Time for a third briefing. Ah, so boring!_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just a very small sidenote: If there are any PJO fans here who ship Kacxa as well (cuz I am one!), I feel that Keith and Kosmo would have the same kind of friendship that Percy has with Blackjack...so, comes in what I added in the story.


	6. Hypotheses, Part - I

Krolia looked around at the assorted bunch of people gathered in the briefing hall of the Blade Headquarters. To her left, Kolivan was typing on his monitor. To her right, Ilun polished her blade whereas Vrek and the two Alteans Tavo and Rian were involved in a deep conversation about sclera and eyeballs. Syra was absentmindedly tapping at the table with her claws. Next to her, Merla was speaking in hushed tones and Acxa was listening intently to her.

She had never attended a war meeting with this minimum number of members before. All the senior Blades were either missing in action or killed. She remembered the first time they had discovered the asteroid floating in the perfect hiding place in between the two black holes and the blue giant. _The founding members of the Blade of Marmora. Ulaz, Thace, Kolivan and myself. Slowly and steadily, new members had been recruited every decaphoeeb through the Trials of Marmora. Now...?_ The place looked hauntingly deserted and gloomy.

She knew Kolivan well enough to know that he was still hurting over the incidents of the past many decaphoeebs even if he always maintained his unbroken pokerface. Physically, he was fully healed. However, his mind bore so many wounds which Krolia guessed might never be healed. She had advised him that he wasn’t responsible for the deaths of all his subordinates. All he kept repeating was, “They trusted me, Krolia. I let them down. I was the one who led them into the death trap. They all perished because of me. They came in search of me and...”

Presently, Kolivan lay down his monitor and folded his arms over the table. “Today, we have finally gathered in one place after such a long time. I know I have been...inexcusably absent for the past three decaphoeebs. But the fact that none of you lost sight of your missions during that period but continued to work relentlessly, is most commendable.” Krolia noticed a slight change in her fellow Blades’ features which might have been a quiet exultation on Kolivan’s rare and hard-earned applaud.

“And, Acxa? I have heard of all your contributions for the Blades and the Voltron Coalition.” Acxa bowed her head in acknowledgment but said nothing.

“As for the Alteans - Tavo, Merla and Rian, I am glad that you are safe. We will do everything we can to find the rest of your people.”

Tavo’s halfhearted smile didn’t reach his eyes. “Thank you for your kind words, Kolivan. However, our greatest worry is that we already might be too late.”

“I understand your concern, Tavo. Right now, all we can do is act out our part and hope for the best. That brings us to the subject of today’s meeting. We need to form a proper chronology for the past three decaphoeebs and find out all those events which still require some light to be shed.”

“Exactly.” Krolia spoke up. “Right from the battle between Lotor and Voltron, we have had so many unexplainable occurrences over the time.”

Ilun frowned in confusion. “What of the battle? Didn’t Voltron defeat Lotor?”

“Yes, Lotor is dead and Voltron left him in the Quintessence field. But what of the Sincline ships he built? They are indestructible because they are made from the same material as Voltron. That surely means that the Sincline ships are still in the Quintessence field and can fall into wrong hands at any time.”

Acxa shook her head. “I fear that is too farfetched, Krolia. The only material that can pass through the rift between two realities is the Trans-reality comet. And as far as I know, the only vehicles built from that comet are Voltron and Sincline. So, other than Voltron, I don’t think anyone else can retrieve the Sincline ships from the Quintessence field.”

Krolia pondered over her statement. _It makes sense when she puts it that way...but then, why does my instinct scream that we are sitting on a ticking granular bomb?_

However, Acxa’s speculations seemed to satisfy Kolivan. “Hmm...I suppose, we can pass _that_ problem for now. Moving forward...” He referred to his monitor. “The dispatch of the team of the four Blades to the Altean colony. This mission was a failure with one casualty and the whole colony missing, except for three. Vrek, any success in procuring further information about Haggar?”

“Unfortunately, no. The tracker, which I had planted onto the cargo ship just before it took off, is missing. Not destroyed, but missing.”

“Um, what does that mean?”

Vrek put his tablet on the table for everyone to see. It beeped intermittently indicating that it was still scanning for the tracker’s whereabouts. “The tracker returns a distress code back to the subroutine if it gets destroyed. I haven’t received any such signal, so we can safely presume that Haggar hasn’t got rid of the device yet.”

Krolia raised a brow. “How does it tell us anything, Vrek? I mean, yes, your device is missing. So are the witch and the people. That is the very problem we are trying to solve.”

Vrek blinked as though realizing the difficulty only then. “Oh. Yes, you are right. I got too focused on the...uh yeah, so well--”

“Ilun, Vrek and Syra constructed a large map based on the locations of the current Galra factions,” Acxa stood up from her seat. “During my time under Haggar, I had regularly logged the coordinates of all the posts we visited throughout the Empire. Originally, I had prepared this for Lotor but, well, due to the unforeseen change of plans...I gave up this intel at the disposal of the Blades.”

Kolivan sat forward expectantly. “Good. Show me.”

“Yes, so we cross-referenced the data from both the sources as well as the intel we received from the Coalition...and came up with this.” She pulled up a 3D hologram of an enormous map of entire star systems, formerly under the Empire.

Krolia was impressed. She had some of her own misgivings about trusting Acxa, but seeing the kind of results she had achieved by working with the Blades, she felt ashamed about entertaining such notions. _Everyone deserves a second chance, don’t they? She believed Lotor would bring unity and stability to the Empire, just as we had thought Zarkon would. When she realized Lotor sought only power, she immediately left his side. Perhaps, her heart is truly on the right side._

“As you can see, the ones in the green are under the Voltron Coalition that is weakened at the moment. Those marked in red are the Galra factions which have been completely wiped out or abandoned for reasons we cannot be sure yet. The ones in purple are under Galra commanders who have declared their...independence you can say for the lack of a better word, from the Empire and established their own fleet.”

Ilun waved her dagger loosely at the chart. “In a nutshell, the Galra Empire is divided and lost to anarchy, Kolivan. And I am speaking not just about the Blades but the citizens as well.”

“When the masses are left to themselves without a strong leader, this is exactly what happens. They start to follow the one who takes advantage of the chaos and rises up by inspiring either fear or loyalty.”

She whipped out her dagger at Kolivan. Krolia leaned back lightly to protect her eyes from getting poked. “How about we launch an attack on all these factions, get rid of them and seize power?”

Krolia scoffed internally as she spotted Syra heaving a sigh of defeat. _She must have had a tough time trying to keep Ilun in check._ Ilun had always been a full-blooded Galra lady who loved to kill all those she considered were her enemies. There was only a thin line that separated her from the Galra aggressors under Zarkon’s reign. The reason why she was sent only for high profile assassinations, and never for intel gathering missions. Of course, Ilun was a fiercely loyal and honorable warrior, and an integral part of the Blades.

Kolivan gave her a diplomatic nod. “We will come to that later, Ilun. Acxa, is there any other information you need to share?”

Acxa was staring wide eyed at Ilun’s proposition. She cleared her throat. “Uh, yes, I do. The thing is that had Haggar took refuge in any of these planets, Vrek’s tracker would have detected her cargo ship. So, my inference is that she isn’t there in any of these galaxies.”

“But what if Haggar turned our game on us?” Tavo asked. “She could have abandoned the ship, with that the detector.”

“In that case, we would have found the ship.”

“Oh, yeah.”

She nodded and turned to Kolivan. “As I have already mentioned, there is only one planet that we haven’t been able to get a read on so far. Oriande.”


	7. Hypotheses, Part - II

Krolia had known for long that the so-called High Priestess Haggar was not Galra. When Acxa had told them that she was actually the alter ego of Honerva, a celebrated Altean scientist 10000 decaphoeebs ago, wife of Zarkon and mother of Lotor, she was truly shocked. _An Altean brought the downfall of Altea!_

“So, you say that Haggar remembers her past now?”

“Yes, or at least, that is what I think. She had addressed herself as Honerva, the Altean alchemist and as Lotor’s mother during our final encounter. More importantly, she had come to the full knowledge of this only after her visit to Oriande. Something major must have happened there.”

Tavo nodded thoughtfully. “Oriande is supposedly the sacred and mystical temple of the ancient Alteans. I was always something of an explorer, as much as Lotor allowed us to, of course...but, yes, I wanted to find out more about our true Altean roots, not just limited to Lotor. I had thought that the legend of Oriande was merely a myth. Heck, I thought even Voltron was just a myth. Turns out all of these are actual places and people. Coming to the matter on hand, yes, there is a good chance that Haggar might have remembered her past as Honerva after her visit to Oriande.”

Rian looked at Tavo. “So, is this like a good thing or a bad thing?”

“Bad thing, of course. Honerva or Haggar, she has captured our people.”

“Which is why this mission is going to be so important,” Krolia added. She chose her next words carefully. “Acxa, I know that you have been to Oriande once and appreciate that you volunteer to check on this place. But I would prefer you take someone with you. Other than Merla, that is.”

“What are you even talking about?!” Tavo gasped loudly. “You both plan to go to freaking Oriande, the very planet you suspect Honerva to be? Just the two of you? Merla, are you crazy? What if--”

“Tavo, I know you are worried about me and I am most grateful for that but...for our friends, for our families, this must be done,” Merla reached out and grasped his hand. “Since my parents got killed for Lotor’s evil experiments, my guess is that I must also have their pure Altean Quintessence. I might be able to sneak into this Oriande and get some vital information about our people or at least what is going on there.”

“In other words, you want to risk your life alone. What did I ever tell you about sticking together? We are in this together or we die together. No, Rian and I are coming _with_ you.”

Acxa glanced at Krolia for her suggestion. She was hesitant. If they were under the Blade of Marmora, she could have ordered them to follow her instructions. But they were Alteans, their allies not her juniors.

Apparently, Kolivan too was facing the same dilemma. “I hate the idea of risking all of you--”

Rian broke in hotly. “We don’t need your permission, Kolivan. You are not our leader.”

“Of course, all I can warn you is that this is highly suicidal. I don’t want to lose any more of our allies and colleagues in this futile war.”

Tavo put his hand on Rian’s arm and made him sit down. “Kolivan, we understand the risks. But Merla isn’t going on any ill-advised adventures on her own. I am not allowing that. Plus I know there is enough space in Acxa’s fighter for the four of us.”

Acxa didn’t look happy about the idea. But she sighed and shrugged her agreement.

Syra had been silently observing the whole conversation so far. Presently, she asked, “What about Haggar’s druids?”

“They are all dead.”

Everyone turned to look at Acxa. She had spoken with so much conviction that Krolia was surprised. “You have solid proof regarding this?”

“Uh, no. I just imagined that must be the situation. Because... Krolia, do you remember how Macidus the druid claimed that Haggar had forsaken them because of my treachery? I suppose that is the truth. She must have assigned them to get rid of all the Blades so that she could continue with whatever plans she has for the Alteans. I don’t think she took him or any of the other druids to her secret location. I know for sure that it was Macidus who manned Haggar’s ship from the colony. He is the senior most of her druids and as far as I guess, the last of them.”

“Wow, that is wild conjecture, Acxa,” Krolia said. She had to marvel at the quick but somewhat foolhardy intuition of this girl which she had many a times seen in Keith as well. “But Keith did say that Macidus was in charge of handling the secret shipments of raw Quintessence throughout the Empire. So, what you say might be correct.”

Kolivan grunted his acquiescence. “With this theory as the working hypothesis, we can also safely surmise that she assigned the druids to kill not just our Blades but the other Galra warriors as well. I am quite sure that is what must have happened to the Galra factions that got wiped out.”

“The druids killed the Galra citizens? How? Why? Don’t they work for the Empire and Zarkon?”

Krolia shook her head. “No, Vrek. The druids are loyal only to their High Priestess Haggar...not to the Galra or Zarkon. If she had axed them and promised them entry back into the ranks on the successful massacre of all the Galra, I suppose they would obey her commands.”

A silence spread across the table as her words sank in. She sadly remembered her numerous colleagues and trainees who had died at the hands of the evil witch and her henchmen. She had retrieved all the blades that Macidus had hung up as his trophies. _Their sacrifice will never be forgotten._

She was shaken from her thoughts as Kolivan continued, “But, there is more. The Archivist had called for the Kral Zera sometime after Lotor’s disappearance. We never knew what happened there.”

“Why, what do you mean?”

“None who attended the ceremony lived the day. No survivors.”

Krolia thought about it. _No survivors? That can be explained easily._ Syra spoke exactly what she was thinking. “Perhaps, all the factions broke loose trying to grab power and killed each other in the process.”

“That wouldn’t explain the death of the Archivist.”

“Wait, what?!”

“The Archivist has never been seen after that day,” Kolivan replied. “Neither was the team I dispatched to Planet Feyiv. And of course, no new Emperor was crowned at the second Kral Zera following the short reign of Lotor.”

Ilun put up her hand. “Perhaps, we can go to the Planet Feyiv and try to find out what had happened there?”

“I can bet 1000 gacs that the answers would all point to Haggar. There won’t be the need of a special mission for that.”

Ilun didn’t look satisfied by Vrek’s reply. “But, surely, the question arises as to why Haggar would want to kill the Galra? She has been Zarkon’s key advisor and ruled beside him for eons.”

“All she wanted was a puppet for her to rule,” answered Acxa. “Or at least, that is what Prince Lotor believed. Now that her husband as well as her son is dead, she has no connection left to the Galra Empire.”

“What is her plan now, then? Kill all the Galra and establish an Altean Empire?”

She shrugged nonchalantly. “I don’t profess to understand her every move, Ilun. We definitely need more intel if we are to understand her insights. And again if you think about it, she still has a puppet around.”

“Oh, really? Who?”

“Sendak.”

Krolia cursed internally. “Sendak and his Fire of Purification! Acxa, were you able to contact Keith about this? They would have to hurry on their journey if they hope to stop him.”

“Yes, Krolia, I successfully contacted him today.” Acxa looked like she was trying hard to hide her smile. “I have some good news. Keith and Voltron have reached Earth.”

“Praise the ancients! We were in dire need of something pleasant to ears. But how did he reach Earth so fast?”

“I know not. He told me that he had some help, but didn’t elaborate. And I didn’t want to press for details.”

Krolia was glad that Keith was on safe grounds. _I will contact him tomorrow._ She wanted to get to Earth as soon as she could. At the same time, she knew that the Blades needed her presence more than Keith. _He has to rush into another battle...this time with Sendak? This is so frustrating._ Her hand instinctively pulled her blade out of her pocket to place it on the table in front of her. _He is fine._

Rian made a face of distaste. “Seriously though, I really want to meet this ‘Keith’ guy.”

Everyone, except Kolivan, Acxa and herself, started to snigger. _What? Why? Is there a standing joke about my son?_ Vrek put a hand around his shoulder. “Jealous much?”

“It isn’t like I am jealous, per se...”

“Per se?” Tavo and Vrek couldn’t control their guffaw.

“Hey, I am just trying to match my level of intellect with that of Acxa’s, okay? Things that people like you all would never understand.”

Acxa looked like she sincerely regretted the day she had rescued Rian from the colony. “Rian, you know Krolia, don’t you? She is- she is Keith’s mother.”

His eyes bulged out at the news. “Really? You are the Keith’s mother? Oh, hello, Keith’s mother.”

Krolia slowly nodded in acknowledgement. _What exactly is going on?_ Not able to contain her curiosity, she was almost about to ask Acxa about it when Kolivan advised, “Krolia, send out the Veto Code to the Blades still embedded in the Galra Empire. We need as much manpower as we can.”

After arrival at the Headquarters, she had spent her days hunting for the sparse resources spread across the fallen Empire. _All that is left is sending the code for urgent abortion of their operation and report back to the Headquarters with immediate effect. Veto Code. Something that they never had to have used before. Guess there is a first for everything._ “Copy that.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I guess you can understand what I am trying to do. The episode S8E2 'Shadows' was completely from Haggar's POV (which is impossible for my story). So, I am having our Blades and Alteans discussing and coming to conclusions of their own (which may or may not be right, btw) with Sherlock Holmes-ish kind of deductions (lol!). This was real fun to write but again, it is for my readers to let me know what you think.


	8. Heart of the Lions

**DAY 2**

**1800 hours: Galaxy Garrison**

The entirety of the briefing room waited with bated breath as Pidge revealed the intel they had gathered from the Base One. “Sendak has built Zaiforge cannons. Our intel indicates that the cannons were just completed. They could launch at any moment.”

Commander Iverson leaned forward in his seat on hearing the unfamiliar word. “What exactly is a Zaiforge cannon?”

“Planet killers,” answered Keith. He had been part of the Blade of Marmora team that had hijacked one of the Zaiforge cannon base, Senfama as the first stage of attack on Naxzela. He knew exactly what these cannons were capable of. “If these cannons are launched when they are fully charged, Sendak can destroy Earth in seconds.”

Keith realized that even the most experienced commanders of the Galaxy Garrison had never faced an adversity on this scale before. The atmosphere inside the room crackled with a suspenseful silence, bordering on fear. It was broken by the dark-haired female pilot from Griffin’s team. Nadia Rizavi, he remembered was her name. “So, what do we do?”

He considered the question. _Easier asked than answered._ “Ideally, we attack all six bases at once, allowing them no time to stage a counterattack.”

Admiral Sanda shook her head. “That is not possible.”

“If we had our Lions, it could be. We will have to find some way to retrieve the Lions from Saturn’s moon.”

“Your lions are orbiting another planet.” The Admiral scowled, giving off the impression that she was slowly becoming adverse to the idea of supporting Voltron. “There is no way to get you to them. Plus, there are only five lions.”

Keith got lost in his thoughts and absentmindedly chewed on his lower lip till he drew blood from it. “I think I have an idea how to retrieve the Lions.” _If my conjecture is right, then the Lions should come to us._ “But, yes, Admiral Sanda has a point...there are only five Lions. We don’t have any way to attack the sixth Base simultaneously.”

Commander Holt had been silently observing the entire conversation. Presently, he spoke up. “Maybe, we do. The MFEs. They are built by integrating Earth and Altean technologies. They should have enough firepower to destroy the cannon.”

“Commander, we would love to do that,” Griffin replied, on behalf of his team. “But we don’t have that kind of range.”

Coran pulled at his moustache thoughtfully. “There should be enough Faunatonium to boost the MFEs to the sixth base and back.”

Keith nodded and stood up from his seat. “That sounds like a plan. It should work if we coordinate properly. Once the Zaiforge Cannons are destroyed, Earth will be freed from immediate danger of annihilation. Then, we will have enough time to form Voltron and take out Sendak and his entire fleet.”

Lance cleared his throat as if trying to catch his attention before he could embarrass himself. “Keith, the plan is excellent except for one glaring fact. We don’t have our Lions and we have no way to return to Saturn to get them. So...”

“We don’t have to go to them, Lance. The Lions will come to us.”

Pidge’s worried face slowly eased into a smile as she understood his idea. “The way they came for us when we were trapped in the Infinite Void? Keith, you are a genius!”

Keith smiled internally at her praise but maintained his brooding face on the outside. “So, now, all we have to do is to tap into our bond with our Lions and reach out to them. And if the five of us can somehow reach the Base the same time the Lions arrive on Earth, we will lose no time in destroying the cannons.”

“Woohoo!” Hunk pumped his fist. “The Galra will be really caught off guard and left wondering what just hit them.”

However, the Garrison officials looked skeptical. “The lions will come to you?” Commander Sablan asked. “How? They are automated spaceships with remote autopilot mode acting on your brain commands or something?”

“Close.” _Allura must be dying inside after listening to such a fantastic description of the Lions of Voltron._ “The Paladins of Voltron have a mystical bond with their Lions reflected in their Quintessence. The bond between the Lion and the pilot needs to be earned and cannot be forced. This is something greater than science could ever explain.”

All the humans in the room were staring wide-eyed at Allura after her formal explanation. She gritted her teeth. “Yes, the Lions will fly here via _remote-autopilot-mode_.”

But Admiral Sanda didn’t seem satisfied by her explanation. “I can’t believe that I am supposed to leave the fate of Earth in the hands of teenagers who claim to have some sort of an unexplainable bond with their space vehicles.” She pointed her finger at Keith. “The so-called leader of this bunch is a Garrison dropout and has a never-ending history of disciplinary issues. Then, this one-” She waved her hand at Pidge who was standing at the head of the table. “-hacked herself illegally into the Garrison records under a false name and false identity.” Pidge started to protest but Commander Holt held her back. “We have two more cadets we regretted ever having admitted into the Garrison. Then, there is this lady who claims to be the princess of some unknown, unheard of planet. And I am to trust you all?”

Keith felt his stomach churning in anger. _You can say what you want about me. I don’t care. But you dare speak ill of my friends?!_ “Admiral, you can call out on us as much as you like. But it isn’t going to change the fact that only we have firsthand experience fighting Zarkon as well as his son Lotor and emerged victorious in both the battles. Sendak has been Zarkon’s right hand man for centuries. Voltron is the only weapon on Earth which stands a chance against his armada. You don’t have a choice in that.”

“I am well aware of this, cadet and you don’t have to rub it in my face--”

“Sorry to interrupt you, Admiral,” Pidge was typing something furiously into her screen. “But you need to listen to this. There was an enveloped code I had downloaded from the Base from where we found out that Sendak had built Zaiforge cannons. And I hadn’t been able to break into it till now...Okay, to make a long story short, I think this code gives the approximated timestamp of the launch of the cannons.”

The news certainly shook everyone into complete silence. “And?”

“And the cannons are going to launch at 0300 hours of...which day? Oh...wait, no!” Her face turned a shade paler.

“What does it say, Pidge?” Keith ventured. 

“The Zaiforge cannons have only 30 minutes left to launch!”

**1845 hours: Galaxy Garrison**

Keith was utterly shocked on hearing the news but forced himself to recover fast. “Then, we don’t have any time to lose. We have to get to the Bases immediately.”

James Griffin reacted to the situation better than any of the other experienced Garrison commanders. “My pilots can transport four of you to the Galra bases before heading to the sixth cannon. Veronica can bring the fifth paladin to Base One.”

“Copy that, Griffin. I will take Lance to Base One.”

All the Paladins started to leave for their missions, when Admiral Sanda stood up abruptly and raised her hand in a stop all gesture. _What now?_ “Commander Holt!”

Commander Holt held his wife’s hands and gently laid his hand on Pidge’s shoulder before stepping up to salute the Admiral. _Is this really necessary now? Time is running short!_ “For the past four years, you have done nothing but defy my direct orders, divulge top secret information and break every rule of the Garrison. You are to be subjected to a court-martial for this.”

Commander Iverson and Colleen Holt started to protest. “Admiral Sanda! We--”

But Admiral Sanda didn’t let them finish what they wanted to say, “You say you are a better leader than I am? Then, prove it. Empty talks don’t do anything. You have had zero success launching the Atlas? Right now, I _command_ you to get it off the ground. If you have to take help from the Altean engineer, do it. If you have to dig for a crystal, do it! Get it up and flying in the next 30 minutes stat. I cannot let these teenagers take the whole responsibility of saving the Earth while we sit around doing nothing.”

Commander Holt slowly realized what the Admiral was saying. His face settled into a grim expression as he clicked his feet together and saluted her once again. “Roger that, Admiral!”

“Let’s defend our home with our lives! For Earth!”

“For Earth!” Their shouts must have echoed throughout the Galaxy Garrison.

**1849 hours: Voltron**

Keith sat in the backseat of the MFE piloted by Griffin. He closed his eyes and reached out to Black. Instantly, he was transported to the realm where his mind got connected to the other Paladins’. Allura was anxious to find her people and worried that Earth would end up like Altea at the hands of the Galra. Hunk’s sorrow on not being able to meet his parents washed over him. Pidge was freaking out about the small time window of the launch of the Zaiforge cannons. _Where is Lance?_

Before he could find an answer to his question, Black stood in front of him. He felt the familiar pull in his mind as he and the Black Lion became each other’s eye. The other three Paladins connected to their respective Lions. One by one, the Lions came up alive and let out their usual triumphant roars which Keith could only hope didn’t reach Sendak’s ears. _Lions, ever heard of being low-key?_

Hunk sent back his reply. _Man, we can all hear your sarcastic thoughts now that our minds are connected._

Keith smiled nervously. _Quiznack, I gotta be careful with my thoughts now. Okay, guys, let’s go._

Together, they set out for Earth. They passed by another one of Saturn’s moon, the giant rings of the planet and Jupiter’s moon before coming to stop before the Ceres asteroid belt.

Keith could feel his fellow Paladins’ doubt. He let out his thoughts into their minds. _Paladins, follow me. Stay in formation. We can do this. We can get through the asteroid belt._

**1850 hours: Galaxy Garrison**

Admiral Sanda wondered whether she had committed the biggest blunder of her life by not giving up the Lions to Sendak in exchange of the safety of Earth. At the last moment, she had decided to throw in her lot with Commander Holt and his bunch of absconders on whom he completely pinned his hopes of saving Earth.

Even though she hated to admit it, had Sam not prepared Earth for an imminent attack from the Galra, the planet would have been conquered by Sendak months ago. It was only because of the particle barrier, the MFEs, fusion cannons and some of the other advanced weapons he had designed and built from scratch that this small pocket of Earth was still thriving.

Presently, she turned to Curtis who was at the communications deck. “Send out the interference to scramble the transmission from the Galra fighters near Earth’s orbit. The Lions should be able to pass into the atmosphere undetected.”

“Roger.” _25 minutes more and the fate of Earth will be decided, one way or the other._

**1851 hours: IGF Atlas**

“Anything?”

Commander Holt watched as Coran expertly went through all the subsystems aboard the Atlas, trying to find out some way to power the ship. “Not yet. Maybe, we can shut down all non-essential systems and use an external source to fire one engine.”

Sam shook his head. “We tried that. It wasn’t enough power.”

“What about the crystals from the MFEs?”

He raised his brow expectantly. “You think that would work?”

“Actually no, scratch that. Far too small,” Coran scratched his neck. “You don’t happen to have any Nunville, do you?”

“Nunville?”

**1852 hours: IGF Atlas**

“Wait, Sam. I think I have an idea. We can divert power from the shield generator to the Atlas. The base would be unprotected, but it’s possible. And it might just work.”

Sam Holt felt a small glint of hope. _Why did I never think of this before?_ He called out to the Garrison. “Commander Iverson, how much time do we have till the Zaiforge cannons launch?”

“Approximately 22 minutes more.”

Admiral Sanda’s voice came over the comm. It was hard to say but she too seemed a little bit hopeful. “Sam, did you find a way to power the Atlas?”

“A way, yes. We aren’t sure yet if it would work. Commander Iverson, get all personnel aboard this ship immediately.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Also, transfer all data from Mission Control to the Atlas.”

“Yes, sir.”

**1859 hours: Voltron**

Keith loved flying through the Ceres Belt. Ironically, the adventure through the asteroid field soothed his nerves a lot. He kept an eye on his team as they followed him closely and stuck to his side. _Guys, where is Lance?_

_Guess he hasn’t connected with his Lion yet._

Allura sounded quite tensed. _Red is quite temperamental. What if she doesn’t respond to Lance at all?_

_Keith, should we wait for him? How will he get through the asteroid field — whoa, look out...!_

A large asteroid was two seconds to impact on his Lion. Keith dove down even as his team cleverly crossed over to the right and left. _Phew, that was close._

Soon, they found themselves out of the Ceres Belt and a loud mental cheer went through the team. Minutes later, he was looking at the blue rim of the Earth’s atmosphere. _We are here, guys. The Garrison must have sent interference to clear a path for us. Let’s get in before the sentries gain vision and spot our Lions._

_Copy that._

**1908 hours: Voltron**

Aboard the MFE, Keith opened his eyes. Sure enough, Black was floating in the sky below his position. Green flew into the thick jungles of South America, Yellow into the deserts of Africa, and Blue into the frozen glaciers of Northern Asia. _Except for Red. We would have to hurry if we are to cover for Lance._

As soon as he climbed into his Lion, Griffin charged up his MFE with Faunatonium and disappeared out of sight. _Hope they reach the sixth cannon in time too._

He opened his communications link to the other Lions, the MFEs and the Garrison. He tried to connect to the Red Lion. “Lance, do you copy?”

He received nothing but static. He took a deep breath and called out to the rest of his team. “Team, you know what to do. The time window is razor thin. Let’s fight today without any regrets.”

“Roger that, Team Leader.”

**1910 hours: Base One**

Lance had always doubted his worth as a Paladin of Voltron. It wasn’t like he was capable of anything useful. Sure, he was the team’s sharpshooter, but it wasn’t something unique to him like Keith’s flight techniques, Pidge’s hacking skills or Allura’s alchemic knowledge. To make matters worse, his hopeless crush on Allura was so ridiculous that she might laugh in his face if she came to know about it.

He took another long breath. _Lance, now isn’t the time to think about all that. We have a mission on hand._

He closed his eyes and tried to connect with his Lion. However, his mind kept getting distracted by his surroundings. _What if Veronica gets shot? What if she couldn’t get back to the Garrison in time? What if the Galra kidnap...Just stop. I need to find Red. Red, can you hear me?_

All of a sudden, he was jolted out of his thoughts by a huge blast that threw their vehicle careering off course. He hit his head hard on the door, losing his consciousness.

When he came round, he found himself lying on open ground. He slowly looked around him to spot the wreckage of their Rover in one corner. _No! The vehicle is about to explode. Veronica is too close!_

He rushed to her and pulled up his shield to protect her from the explosion. It was then that he realized what happened. The drones had spotted them crossing into their territory and fired at them. They must have called for backup for tens of more drones and sentries were on their way to their position.

Veronica was still unconscious. There was no way she could protect herself. _I am not gonna let those things get to her._ With a loud yell, he pulled out his rifle to shoot as many hostiles as he could. For a moment, he thought he was actually winning. Soon, a large Galra fighter appeared right in front of him, its lasers charged and ready to wipe him out of existence.

He closed his eyes for one last time. He was deemed to be a letdown everywhere. His team was going to fail because of him. _Red, please save Veronica if I die._

A loud crunch next to him made him open his eyes to see his Red Lion in front of him, crushing the fighter under her claws. _You are here?!_

In answer, she raised her head to let out a mighty roar. Lance stared wide-eyed at her even as Veronica stirred behind him. His heart overflowed with happiness. _We still have a chance to make things right, don’t we?_

But, the answer was no. Behind him, Base One Zaiforge Cannon was launching.


	9. Trial By Fire

**DAY 2**

**1915 hours: Voltron**

Seven minutes. That was the time Black took to turn Base Three into a blazing inferno.

In those seven minutes, Keith and the Black Lion served perfectly as each other’s eyes. He didn’t even have to shout the orders for her to understand. Jaw blade, laser fire and once, she spread her astral wings to give the maximum boost to finish the job. Finally, he stopped to admire their handiwork. He gave his Lion a mental high-five. _What about the other Paladins, Leader?_

_Exactly. Thanks, Black._ “Team, report the status of your cannons.”

He was most worried about Lance. _What has happened to him? Did they not reach the Base yet? Has Red arrived on Earth?_ He tried to connect to the Red Lion for the hundredth time. “Base One...? Lance, are you there? Do you copy?”

Thankfully, Lance answered. “Keith, I copy. And I failed in my mission,” His voice was close to breaking. “Red arrived seconds before the cannon launched. I-I could do nothing.”

Keith wanted to console him but they had to hurry. “Okay. Lance? Hold your position. Base Two, Pidge?”

“Keith, negative. I am taking heavy fire. The cannon has launched. I couldn’t stop it.”

He felt his confidence crumbling. _One cannon can be destroyed easily, but two...?_ “Pidge. Hold your position for now. Base Four? Hunk?”

“Copy that,” Hunk sounded very pleased with himself. “The Zaiforge cannon has been successfully neutralized. Base Four is no longer a threat.”

Allura joined in. “Same for Base Five, Keith. However, I have been able to destroy _only_ the Zaiforge cannon. The base might still be operational.”

He wondered if that would be a problem. _Hopefully not._ Just then, Griffin’s voice came through over the comm. “Keith, Griffin here. Reporting negative. The firepower from the MFEs is not sufficient to destroy the cannon. Zaiforge cannon Base Six has launched.”

Keith was disappointed with how their mission turned out. But, he knew that it would be best to think about how to set things right rather than fretting over it. “Okay, so three of six Zaiforge cannons have launched. Meaning, Earth is still at a substantial risk.” He took a deep breath to calm himself. “Griffin, do you know what is going on with the Garrison? I am not able to contact them.”

“We just received communication that they have successfully loaded all personnel into the Atlas. They are preparing for the launch.”

_That is some good news._ He knew they had no more time to waste. “MFEs, return to the Garrison. Cover for the Atlas as it launches. Sendak is sure to attack the base for it’ll be most vulnerable then.”

The four MFE pilots spoke in one voice. “Roger that.”

“Lions, converge on me. Let’s take this fight to the upper atmosphere. Form Voltron!”

**1916 hours: IGF Atlas**

Commander Holt was at his console aboard the Atlas. “We are all set. I’m ready to divert power from the barrier generator.”

“Copy that.” Coran’s reply from the helm was immediate. “We’re ready to receive.”

Sam Holt raised the barrier power generator to full and watched as the energy chart beeped at critical. Coran’s plan seemed to be working so far. The particle barrier around the Galaxy Garrison was lowered step by step as the power got diverted to the IGF Altas. _If this doesn’t work, we will be defenseless on both fronts. This is a huge but calculated risk, almost suicidal._

Seconds later, his console pinged, indicating completion. “We got it. The ship is charged.”

He heard Admiral Sanda’s voice over the comm. “Is everyone aboard?”

“The Garrison is clear, Admiral,” answered Commander Iverson. “We are all in.”

The Admiral gave a single order. “Prepare for launch.”

His heart soared with pride and delight as the Atlas proceeded to get airborne. _The main engines are online, the subsystems are powered, the megathrusters are go._ Just as he thought that the power from the barrier generator would be sufficient for the gigantic ship, it failed. All of a sudden, the energy chart dropped to zero. With that, the Atlas, which had risen some inches from the ground, fell down with a thud.

But that wasn’t the whole of the bad news. The communication tower got destroyed in one blast of a low orbiting Galra cruiser. _Sendak has seen Garrison’s paricle barrier going down. He must have been waiting for the opportune moment. We are doomed._

**1930 hours: Voltron**

_Why did I ever sign up to be a leader? All I wanted was to live in a desert, not fight a bunch of Galra fighters which keep coming like honeybees shaken from their honeycombs._

Keith dragged his reluctant mind back to the battle that was raging on all sides. His battle reflexes told him that the heavy fire from the Galra cruisers on Voltron was a tactic to divert them away from the Zaiforge cannons as they were slowly moving to position in the exosphere.

“Sendak must have called for backup.” Pidge analyzed the condition. “More cruisers incoming.”

Keith shouted his command. “Hunk, form shoulder cannon.”

“On it.”

The zigzag laser beams from the shoulder cannon hit directly on the line of the fighters, destroying one-eighth of them and buying them some time. Keith maneuvered them to get closer to the Zaiforge cannons. “We need to take down the Zaiforge cannons now. Lance, form sword!”

The sword had not yet materialized when Lance yelled, “Keith, watch out at our nine!”

“Pidge, shield!”

The heat from the ion cannon was almost unbearable despite the shield. Pidge gasped breathlessly. “Keith, unless we find a way to take out all these ion cannons on the Galra cruisers, they will never let us get anywhere near the Zaiforge cannons.”

He pushed his thrusters forward and moved them out of the way. The beam passed them to melt one of their own cruisers. _Woah! They are not even bothered about that? Sendak is truly here for a do-or-die battle._

Again, they were completely surrounded by heavy fire. Pidge held up their shield as team Voltron desperately searched for a plan. “Now, what?”

Allura stated her observation of their current state. “We need someone to fight the cruisers as we take down the Zaiforge cannons. We need backup. The Atlas, what-- Ah!”

Everyone grunted as the ion cannons increased the intensity on their shield.

**1935 hours: MFE Squadron**

James Griffin had to grudgingly appreciate the fact that Keith correctly anticipated the imminent attack on the Garrison while the Atlas was launching. They arrived from Base Six just in time to see a Galra cruiser attacking the now unprotected base. He shouted his orders to his team. “Rizavi, Kinkade, draw their fire away from the base.”

“Roger that.”

He opened his communication channel to the Atlas. “Atlas, do you copy?”

Admiral Sanda responded immediately. “Officer Griffin, what is the status of your mission?”

“Negative, Admiral. We were able to neutralize only three of the six Zaiforge cannons. The rest of them have launched. Voltron is trying to destroy them, but they are currently pinned down by heavy fire. They need backup immediately.”

She was silent for one long minute. “We will do what we can. Right now, I need you to defend the base as we prepare to launch the Atlas.”

“Roger that, Admiral.” He noticed one more Galra cruiser, descending towards the base and turned to his second-in-command and his chief battle strategist in the Squadron, Ina Leifsdottir. “Leifsdottir, what do you see?”

She rattled off her observations in her usual monotonous voice. “Two cruisers, 76 fighters, temperate weather patterns, blue skies. The perfect conditions for--”

_Perfect conditions for...what? Come on, Ina, we are in the middle of a freaking battle!_ “No, Leif. Battle evaluations?”

She blinked in late understanding. “A variation of a tactical circular formation. They're protecting the cruisers to allow them more accurate shots.”

Proof to her words, the cruisers aimed two simultaneous powerful explosions on the Garrison grounds. _Hope they didn’t blow up someone important._

**1940 hours: IGF Atlas**

Commander Holt walked into the bridge of the Atlas, his head hung in shame. He halfheartedly saluted the Admiral. “I am ready for my court-martial, Admiral. I am the one who put everyone in jeopardy. I forced the Board to spend all our time and resources in building a ship that is useless.”

The Admiral looked more dismal than angry. “Commander Holt, let’s worry about our cadets who are fighting for their lives outside than a court-martial right now. I understand this plan of yours failed. Think. How else can we power up our ship?”

But Sam Holt was at his wits’ end. “I don’t know!” he retorted hotly. “Maybe the power of several supermassive black holes would get this...hunk of metal off the ground!”

Coran pricked his ears. “That’s it! Why didn’t I think of this before?” He rushed to where Sam was standing and pulled out a glowing crystal from his pocket. “Of course! Black Holes! Infinite Mass! It was always right here.”

His eyes widened in shock. “Coran, what...exactly?”

“The crystal was created after the destruction of the Castle of Lions,” Coran explained. “It's an amalgamation of the Quintessence Field collapsing from infinite mass into this tiny thing.”

Sam pulled out his energy monitor. _Wow, the power emitted from this crystal is spiking._ “The energy coming off this Infinite Mass...crystal is incredible. We need to get it hooked up to the Atlas immediately.”

He pulled up the containment unit in the bridge. “This is where I had originally planned to place a Balmeran crystal. We’re going to have to figure out a way to accommodate for the difference in size. It will--” 

He was cut short when the crystal moved on its own accord, from Coran’s palm into the containment unit as if it had been waiting for this exact moment. Instantly, the ship came to life all around them. All the subsystems became fully charged. “I can’t believe it. It’s amazing!”

A whoop of joy went throughout the Atlas crew. Commander Iverson took charge of the weapons subsystem, Coran rushed back to the helm and Veronica, who had just boarded the Atlas after dropping off her brother at Base One, took her designated seat to monitor the radars and pick up any communications.

Admiral Sanda turned to him, her face showing no signs of any emotions as usual. “Commander Holt, lock on to the position of Voltron. We need to provide them with covering fire immediately.”

He was still reeling in amazement at the sudden and incredible success of his project, but he managed to salute her. “Roger that, Admiral!”

**1955 hours: Voltron**

Voltron hacked down several cruisers with their sword, but Sendak’s fleet seemed to have no end. “Guys, the only way to end this battle is to cut the head off the snake. Let’s take out Sendak himself,” Keith looked at the sketch of the main cruiser Jaxar Alpha on the console. “He must be aboard that ship. We need to find some way to cross through this cruiser blockade to get to him.”

“How about we split up?” Hunk mused. “They are able to attack at a single point now that we are as Voltron... but if we split up, each Lion might be able to take down more fighters.”

“But then, we won’t be able to shield ourselves from the blasts from the ion cannons. We cannot risk our Lions losing power in the middle of the battle, right?”

Keith tried to contact the Garrison again. He had to know if they had successfully launched the Atlas and if they could provide some support. Only the call ended in static and a long beep. _No help from that end then, I guess._ But, the more unsettling subject was that the three Zaiforge cannons were being remotely moved to a certain position above Earth. _What exactly is Sendak doing? If his plan is to destroy Voltron using the cannons, they are not being positioned in the required trajectory. If he wants to destroy Earth...he can do it now._

Voltron progressed inch by inch toward Sendak’s cruiser, slashing through the ships on the way. Suddenly, a massive column of energy struck them from apparently nowhere. It was so powerful that Keith almost lost his consciousness for a second. “What the heck was that?”

Allura was the first to figure it out. “We're under attack from the one of the bases that launched the Zaiforge cannons!”

Pidge was frantically punching the buttons on her console possibly to find a workaround. “They must have been designed to defend the cannons after they launched. Base One, Two, Five and Six are still--”

“Shield!” Keith yelled as soon as he caught another column coming in their direction. _We are being attacked from all angles._ Hunk asked the obvious question. “Should we fall back?”

“No,” Lance replied. “We are too close to retreat.”

“But we can’t take any more shots from the ground based cannons.”

Keith had a sudden idea. “Let’s get in close to the cruiser. They won’t fire on their own ships.” He remembered too late that this wasn’t the case. _Sendak has no problem destroying his own ships to get to us._

And once again, Voltron was pinned down. All of a sudden, three of the cruisers firing on them got destroyed in a flash. Keith watched in utter surprise as the IGF Atlas came in for a landing beside them in the exosphere of the Earth.

**2020 hours: Voltron**

Pidge was beside herself in happiness. “Dad! You launched the Atlas!”

Commander Holt’s voice crackled over the comm. “It was not me, Katie. It was Coran’s idea of using the Infinite Mass Crystal as an energy source that helped the ship to finally get airborne.”

A cheer went through the rest of the Paladins. Keith was relieved as well. “Welcome to the battle, IGF Atlas!”

Of course, they had little time to rejoice. Sendak recovered quickly from the shock of seeing a massive ship built by the seemingly primitive people of Earth and sent out all his fighters to attack both of them.

Admiral Sanda cut to business immediately. “Keith, what is the plan? How should the Atlas help?”

Keith was a bit surprised that the Admiral was asking him for a battle strategy. But then, he realized that she was putting aside her differences for the sake of Earth and its people and accepting his seniority in fighting the Galra. In spite of the stressful situation, it was due to either his battle hardened nerves or his Galra warrior blood that he was able to evaluate their weaknesses and strengths and that of Sendak’s in seconds.

He took a deep breath. “All right, everyone. Here is the plan. Atlas, clear a path for us and cover us while we take down the three remaining Zaiforge cannons.”

“Roger that.”

Next, he called out to the MFEs charging aboard the Atlas. “Griffin, I know the MFEs cannot take out a Zaiforge cannon. But what about the base from where it launched? Will you be able to destroy it?”

A female voice spoke up. “Technically, yes. The base is less sturdy than the Zaiforge cannons. We might be able to attack the base and destroy it before it destroys us.”

“Good. Pidge is sending you the coordinates. Base Three and Four are already down. Griffin, split the remaining four bases among your squadron and finish them before they launch another energy blast on Voltron.”

Griffin answered grimly. “Copy that. You can count on us.”


	10. Fire of Purification

**DAY 2**

**2040 hours: IGF Atlas**

Commander Holt could feel in his bones that something was going to go terribly wrong. A million questions were racing through his mind. _Why has Sendak not fired his Zaiforge cannons yet? What is he waiting for? Why is he repositioning them?_

He watched on his screen as the battle unfolded before him. The tiny triangle marking Voltron was moving steadily toward where the Zaiforge cannons were located while Atlas was continuously laying down covering fire for them.

The positions of the three Zaiforge cannons triggered a slight memory. He immediately ran the calculations and... _No way!_ “Paladins, you must hurry to the Zaiforge cannons!”

“Commander Holt, what is happening?” Admiral Sanda asked.

“I know what Sendak is doing. According to the projected trajectories of the Zaiforge cannons, they started moving together. Now, he is going to converge the beams to make one massive amplified emission of particle radiation.”

She sounded skeptical. “Is that even possible?”

“Yes. I know because I gave them the technology. When I was enslaved, the Galra had me working on particle emission amplification.”

Sam Holt sent them the simulation he had been running based on their current trajectory and continued, “As you see, it leads to a single point in space. Once the cannons are in position, their individual beams will merge together, exponentially increasing their destructive force. It will be powerful enough to completely vaporize Earth.”

Sam heard the Paladins panicking over the news. Keith’s voice came over the comm. He sounded calm but his voice quivered a little. “Commander Holt, how long do we have before the cannons fire?”

He executed the time calculation subroutine and faced another major shock. “2 minutes and 34 seconds.”

**2041 hours: Voltron**

“Keith, the Zaiforge cannons are nearing final position. You will _not_ be able to destroy them all in time,” Sam Holt continued, clearly agitated.

Keith was fast losing his patience. _This is why we should have taken down these cannons before they ever launched! This is so unnerving!_

Admiral Sanda asked, “Commander Holt, what is your suggested course of action? We must do something.”

He thought for a moment. “I would suggest that instead of trying to destroy the cannons, for now, we try to find a way to stop the converged beams from hitting Earth.”

Keith looked at his screen where the simulation was running. It also displayed the approximate coordinates at which the beams from the three cannons would intercept. “Pidge, what about our shield? Would it be able to withstand the impact of the merged beams?”

“Keith! Are you--?” _Nuts? Yep, probably._ Pidge pulled herself together in a beat and continued, “The shield...might withstand the shock of impact...but if it fails, not only will there be a major risk that we-we die, but also that the beam will directly hit Earth thereafter.”

“Then, the Atlas has to form the second line of defense. I suppose the particle barrier can hold out for some time.”

Hunk clucked disapprovingly. “And you think Sendak is going to sit around and wait as we are blocking the beam? He will choose that exact moment to launch a full attack on Earth--”

“And when both our shields fail, the beam will annihilate the planet anyways.” Lance added.

Keith gritted his teeth in frustration. “You guys have a better idea?!”

Nobody ventured any new thoughts. “Then I guess this is the best plan so far. Pidge, we need the shield. We go to the coordinates of convergence and try to hold out as long as we can. In the mean time, Atlas, you guys have to come up with some way to finish off Sendak.”

**2041 hours: MFE Squadron**

James Griffin had given his orders to his team before starting on their way. “Rizavi, you take down Base One. Kinkade, you go for Base Five.”

“Roger.”

He trusted in his and Ina’s flying skills enough to assign the farthest ones - Base Two for her and Base Six for himself. He decided to give a little pep talk for his team as they flew down to their respective bases. “Okay, team. We are going to strafe and burn. Watch for crossfire and--” 

Apparently, his team didn’t need it. Rizavi shouted over the comm, “Destroy the base!”

He sighed in defeat. “Guys, we got only one chance at this. We fly in unseen, drop the projectiles and fly out.” 

The ‘unseen’ part, however, didn’t work out for him as well as he had planned. Two Galra fighters hooked on his trail as he flew in. The Base seemed to be preparing for another attack on Voltron. Ina recited her tactical observations. “The Bases are highly fortified. It’s most vulnerable after it fires. That’s when we attack.”

“Team, you heard Leifsdottir? Let’s move in!”

“Copy that.”

His mission was a success. James shot down the fighters at his six and carved himself enough space to drop four ammunition projectiles right into the base, setting up explosive fireworks. _Base Six has gone down in style._ He simultaneously received positive reports from his fellow teammates. _Well then, I guess, all the Bases?_

“Atlas, all the four cannon bases have been successfully neutralized.” 

**2042 hours: Voltron**

The Red and the Green Lions fired their lasers to clear a circular path around them as Keith maneuvered Voltron to the coordinates where the beams from the Zaiforge cannons were about to converge. The console beeped, indicating that they were in the correct coordinates. “Sam, how long do we have?”

“40 seconds and dropping!”

Keith was growing highly tensed. “Pidge, raise the shield.”

“On it!”

Sendak’s ships started to fire at them with renewed vigor once they found out that Voltron couldn’t use the shield to protect themselves. The Atlas was hopelessly outmatched. _One way or the other, this might be our final battle._

“Keith,” Allura called out to him from the Blue Lion. “I have an idea. Remember how we had uploaded the virus in Zarkon’s Central Command, causing it to lose power. Why can’t we do that now? If Pidge can somehow hack their central communications hub, can’t we shut down all their ships?”

“Excellent idea, Allura,” Pidge cheered. “Except for one small catch. The other day, Keith and Thace had opened a channel from inside the hub. Only then, Antok had been able to upload the virus. Someone has to hook me into the system for me to hack in. Meaning, someone would have to infiltrate the ship. That is like impossible--”

Admiral Sanda’s voice crackled over the comm. “I will do it.”

Keith was surprised. “You...Admiral?”

“During the past years, I have been on his ship _twice_...to try and negotiate with him so that he and his troops would leave Earth. I had secretly taken down the schematics of the cruiser at the time. If I somehow infiltrate it and manage to reach the Central Hub, Sam would be able to hack in and shut down the fleet remotely, right?”

“Yeah, well...but--”

Their 40 seconds were over. Three powerful beams were ejected from the Zaiforge cannons situated at three corners around Earth and intercepted at the coordinate Commander Holt had predicted. Finally, a single, amplified and highly intense beam raced towards Voltron’s location even as Keith yelled. “Paladins, brace for impact!”

**2042 hours: IGF Atlas**

Commander Holt knew that infiltrating Sendak’s ship would be a suicide mission, but Admiral Sanda wasn’t ready to listen to any of his warnings. She ordered the staff to prepare her spacesuit and Coran to bring them closer to the impact site.

“I will jetpack out to Jaxar Alpha and sneak into the main control room. Once in, you can easily upload the shutdown sequence, Commander Holt.”

Sam Holt felt bad that he had only been protesting against whatever the Admiral did for the past four years. _Six, if I count my behavior toward her before embarking for the Kereberos mission._ He had always acted like he had no regard for her words or her thoughts. He just did what felt right to him.

She seemed to read his thoughts. “Sam, you were correct when you said that I wanted to control every situation. I thought by withholding the information about these evil Galra aliens from the citizens of Earth, I was doing the right thing. Clearly, I was wrong. Had it not been for you and Colleen, our planet would have been long captured by Sendak.” She drew a long breath. “If I don’t make it out from this battle, I want you to lead the Galaxy Garrison to newer heights. You have proven that you are really the leader the world needs, a leader that's not afraid to face facts.”

Commander Holt was shocked. “Admiral, you are going to--”

“Are you going to defy my direct orders till the very end?”

He looked up at her but there was nothing harsh in her eyes. He clicked his feet together and stood straight to properly salute her, something he had never done since forever. Commander Iverson followed suit, then Veronica and Curtis and all the remaining personnel on the bridge.

**2043 hours: Voltron**

Keith had never faced such tremendous power from the Galra weapons before. It was almost like the time they were pinned against an asteroid by the three Sincline ships. Voltron had barely been able to hold out for more than a few seconds. Coran had helped them to escape from it by destroying the asteroid, and that was not before rupturing Voltron’s power core and one of Black’s thrusters. 

But now, they were voluntarily blocking the intense beam from the Zaiforge cannons with their shield. One second in, and he could already feel his life force draining.

“Guys, we can’t take this much any longer!” Pidge shouted frantically.

“I know, I know,” Keith breathlessly tried to find the right words. “Team, focus all your energy. We can do this!”

That was easy to say, but with each passing second, their Lions were weakening. “Atlas, what’s happening?”

“Admiral Sanda has left for Jaxar Alpha, guys,” Coran answered. “Hold on a little longer!”

Black’s console started to beep, indicating that the shield was maxed out. _We are not going to make it._ “Coran, draw up the particle barrier and position the Atlas just below us. Our energy levels are running dangerously low. The shield is gonna rupture any second now.”

“Copy that.”

All of a sudden, he heard the Green Lion growling. “Keith, my Lion...”

“Do it!”

Pidge twisted her Bayard in the port and immediately, the Voltron shield increased in size until it was almost five times the original size. _Woah! Why did you never show us this before?_

“Atlas, we have bought ourselves some valuable seconds. Can you please hurry with the plan?”

**2044 hours: Jaxar Alpha**

Admiral Sanda checked the schematics of the cruiser on her arm computer once again. _According to this, the main control room is right here._ She watched as the two sentries were patrolling in front of the room barred by large doors. _How shall I get in?_

Just then, she heard a sentry marching up behind her. She quickly hid behind the column on her left. As soon as it passed her, she sneaked behind and kicked it down. She snatched its blaster and rushed toward the main control room. The sentries started shooting in her direction but she dodged all the blasts. She trained her stolen blaster at the two of them. _Two shots, two robots down. My shooting skills are as good as ever._

She kept the sentry’s broken hand on the palm scanner of the main door. “Sam, I am in the main control room,” she whispered. “Now what?”

“Now, you need to plug in the communication transponder to the central subsystem so that I can hack in.”

“Copy. Activating communication transponder now.”

It took Commander Holt one and a half minute to upload the shutdown sequence. The caricature of a cackling...Katie Holt (?) materialized on the console. One by one, all the subsystems started to shut down.

**2045 hours: Voltron**

Keith heard a distant voice calling out, “Paladins, do you copy? Paladins? Where are you? Allura?!” _It’s Coran._

He forced open his eyes and looked around him. _I am in my Lion? What happened? Where is Voltron?_

He sat up with a bolt. And then, everything came back to him. Even with the enhanced shield, they couldn’t hold out for long. When the shield ruptured, he had not been able to move Voltron out of the way in time. It hit them directly, ripping apart the Lions and rendering all the five of them unconscious. “Coran, Keith here...what is the status?”

“Keith! Ah, thank the ancients! The power in Sendak’s ships will be down for nearly ten doboshes.”

He managed a broken smile. “They did it!”

“Yeah, but can you guys finish up with destroying the Zaiforge cannons first? Atlas can’t hold out for long. Veronica, what is the shielding status?”

It was then that he noticed the beam striking the particle barrier of the Atlas. “24 percent and dropping!” _The particle barrier is already at the breaking point. We need to hurry._

Keith flew to the nearest cannon. “Team, do you copy?”

Allura’s tired voice came in first. “Keith, Allura here. I heard Coran. I-I will take down the cannon on my right.”

Hunk also managed a weak sound-off and proceeded to destroy the final cannon. Lance and Pidge were the last to wake up, having faced the maximum impact. “Lance and Pidge, finish off Sendak’s fleet before the power comes back. We have less than ten minutes now.”

“Copy that.”

Commander Holt issued an urgent warning. “Paladins, don’t destroy Jaxar Alpha. Admiral Sanda is still on that ship. I am trying to contact her...”

**2048 hours: Voltron**

Keith ripped off the laser emitting head of the Zaiforge cannon with the jaw blade of the Black Lion. The blade sliced through the tough metal like butter. As soon as the head fell off, the intensity of the beam on the Atlas reduced. Black fired her laser beam along the length of the cannon, effectively blowing it up into a massive fireball. A few seconds later, Hunk and Allura reported in their status. “Keith, Zaiforge Cannons successfully neutralized.”

The balance of the ten minutes downtime was spent in destroying what remained of Sendak’s Fire of Purification.

**2055 hours: Voltron**

“All the threats to planet Earth had been successfully eliminated,” Veronica reported. “Except for Sendak’s ship. It is free falling towards Earth’s surface. It has already hit terminal velocity!”

_There is always something._ Keith pushed his controls forward. “Guys, we have to guide it to an uninhabited area. Follow me!”

They positioned the Lions below the cruiser and guided it to a remote area past the city. Despite their attempted cushioned landing, the cruiser ended up in a heavy explosion.

**2100 hours: Voltron**

Keith was about to cut through the surface of the cruiser to search for their Admiral when a giant robotic arm emerged out of the rubble. _Sendak!_ He moved his Lion to get out of his eyes.

But Sendak was more interested in his captive. He and his lieutenant pulled out the broken body of Admiral Sanda from the debris and threw her down like a rag doll.

Keith didn’t really like her, but the way the Galra were manhandling her made his blood boil. She gingerly raised her head to glare at them and doubled over coughing. _At least, she is alive!_

Sendak was shaking in rage. “Every ounce of my being will be directed toward the destruction of you and your pathetic planet. Starting with you. Hepta, finish her off!”

The lieutenant raised his hand in a Galra salute. “Vrepit Sa!”

Hepta lifted his blaster for the kill. Sendak was reciting their old Galra motto ‘Victory or death’. Keith saw his opening. _Black, now!_

The Black Lion understood immediately. She tore through the debris of the cruiser to fling Hepta off the ground. He landed against a large rock with a devastating crunch. _Hepta is dead. Next is Sendak..._

Sendak was too stunned to realize what was happening. He probably had been too focused on having captured the Admiral that he forgot all about the Lions. Keith didn’t hesitate. He had had enough of this guy and his oppression. Shiro always said that everyone deserves a second chance and he had given Sendak that, accidently or otherwise. And Sendak had returned with an even larger fleet of loyal followers to terrorize innocent beings. He deserved no more chances. _This one is for you, Shiro,_ Keith thought as he leaped out of from the open jaws of the Black Lion, his Bayard ready in his hands.

With one swoop of his sword, Sendak, the right hand man of Zarkon for millennia and the fiercest of the Galra warriors, fell down on his face and never stirred again.

**2105 hours: Voltron**

Admiral Sanda was dying. Keith looked at the huge gash on her side, the blood that was flowing steadily out from it and realized she was not going to make it. She caught his arm. “Did we-we...save Earth?”

The other Paladins had also knelt down beside him. Pidge had tears in her eyes. “We did, Admiral. If it was not for you, we could never have.”

“Sendak...?”

“He is dead. So are all his forces. The people of Earth are finally free.”

She nodded weakly. “I misjudged you all. I am sorry...you are all true heroes...”

Keith bowed his head. He was no hero. He was only doing what was to be done. She drew another shaky breath. Her distant eyes locked onto the Atlas, coming in for a landing beside the Lions.

He heard Commander Holt’s voice through his helmet. “Paladins, what is happening? Do you need any support?”

“No. We are good.” He stood up from the ground. “All we need is a shroud for the brave hero of Atlas.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A small author's note: In the wake of all that is going on around the world right now, I wish all my dear readers to stay safe and healthy. As important is taking care of your health, so is spreading love and spending time with close family...for life is really short, you know, and memories are all we are left with at the end. :)  
> Love you all!!! Take care :)


	11. Revelations, Part - II

The battle with Sendak was over. The victory celebrations went on for the whole night as the soldiers and civilians alike shed tears and congratulated one another. However, the atmosphere was eerily muted with grief, not only for Admiral Sanda who had sacrificed her life to save the mission at the last minute, but also for all the other soldiers who had got killed at the frontlines when the first wave of Galra invasion occurred.

Keith stood in one corner of the Garrison grounds, watching his team getting hugged and cooed by their families. It was Hunk’s reunion with his mom and dad that warmed his heart the most. He had known firsthand how much Hunk was hurting over his helplessness to help his parents from Sendak’s mining camp. Yet, he had swallowed his rage and worry to fight alongside them in a battle that might very well have been his last. _He is no doubt the bravest among the five of us._

He heard a soft rustle behind him. He turned to find Romelle and his wolf appearing by his side. Kosmo immediately jumped into his arms and started licking his face. It was all Keith could do to stop both of them from falling backwards. He started to giggle. “Dude, come on, it tickles!”

Romelle smiled at Kosmo’s antics. Before he had left for his mission, Keith had asked Romelle to take care of his wolf till he returned. Or if he never. “I am glad you are okay, Keith. We got really worried when that beam hit Voltron. You weren’t responding at all.”

He wanted to protest that it was only for a minute that they had passed out, but she looked genuinely worried for him. As usual, his social awkwardness set in, freezing his brain in its search for the right words. _Should I say thanks, no worries or should I just change the subject?_ He decided on the latter. “Where are Coran and Allura?”

She shifted her gaze to where Hunk was being fed some fruit by his mom as his dad kept patting his shoulders and ruffling his hair. “Coran began bawling his eyes out when the princess returned safely. I felt awkward standing there. I mean, of course, they are Alteans...and they are really nice and kind and accepting. But the two of them and even the mice seem to be a very close-knit family I can never be part of.” 

Keith understood what she was trying to say. He had spent years not fitting in anywhere or with anyone. After his father’s death, he bounced from one foster home to another, ending up most of the times in the juvenile detention center. Even back when he was a cadet at the Garrison, he had got into multiple disciplinary issues. Only Shiro had stood up for him. After he disappeared on the Kereberos Mission, Keith’s life went back to the disaster that it originally was. _I wish you were here, Shiro. You too should have seen the sweet success of our mission._

He was interrupted from his thoughts when Romelle asked, “So, did you hear from Krolia?”

He shook his head. “Not from Krolia but...yeah, they reached the Headquarters safely.”

“Acxa informed you, then?”

He caught a slight change in her voice and turned to her in confusion. Her amethyst eyes were dancing with amusement. “You like her, don’t you?”

“Huh, what?!” His mouth went dry. _What is she even talking about? Why would she imagine something like that? Lance-ugh! The next time I see him, I am gonna strangle him. I knew putting Romelle in the Red Lion was a bad idea._ “Did Lance tell you so? Look, he just makes up stuff like that about-about everyone. Acxa and I are just...um, friends? She is a warrior I have high respect for. I think we are acquaintances...yeah, acquaintances would be correct.” He nodded his head, as if to convince himself rather than Romelle.

She looked curiously at him for one long moment, long enough for him to feel self-conscious. Then she shrugged lightly and moved onto another topic as she usually did.

At around 0500 hours, Commander Holt called for a short meeting for all the Garrison officers and the Paladins. It was more or less a vote of thanks for all their contributions in protecting Earth from the evil Galra forces. Despite Lance’s discreet attempts to shake him awake, the leader of Voltron was embarrassingly nodding off in his seat. The third time his eyes started to droop, he almost tripped over from his chair and banged his knee against the table. He heard his team snickering softly at his misery. _Hey, I am tired and...sleepy, okay?_

Keith scowled and straightened up in his chair to open the incoming message that had startled him awake, when a sudden thought struck him. _What if this is from Acxa?_ Instantly, his brooding leader façade melted away to be replaced by an excited teenager receiving an unexpected phone call from his crush. Only, he didn’t have a crush on Acxa. Or so his mind was telling him. The speed at which his heart finished a hundred meter dash made him seriously doubt whatever his ignorant mind was preaching.

He knew it had to be something mission related she was calling him about, something to do with the Blades or the planet Oriande or Haggar. But somewhere in the depths of his heart, a small hopeful voice chipped in. _What if it is something else? What if she is calling to ask about you? Perhaps, she missed you and wants to...okay, Keith, you sit here indulging in your delicious and never-gonna-happen scenarios while I am off to listen to whatever news Acxa has for me._

Either way, he wasn’t ready to risk picking up the call in front of the other Paladins. Once outside the hall, he tapped his sleeve computer. “Acxa, how are you--uh?” Too late he realized he had mistaken the pair of fierce purple eyes for the pretty indigo ones. “Oh...hi, Mom!”

Lance was making mental plans to take Allura out to some of his favorite spots now that the battle with Sendak was over and Earth was safe. She had been beating herself up too much over whatever had happened. To be precise, too much over Lotor. So, he decided that a day out on the beach and under the warm sky might cheer her up a bit. He personally wanted to think of that as a date, but yeah, just two friends hanging out for fun also would work.

The meeting ended and everyone started to get up from their seats to leave.

Just then, Keith walked into the room after his restroom break. _What has happened to him? Why does he look so pale? Did he see something terrifying in the restroom?_ Lance had heard many stories about scary ghosts lurking around in the Garrison after sunset. That is why he always used to drag Hunk around with him wherever he went, not that he would admit it out loud. But Keith was a guy who could get frightened of literally nothing. So, he guessed it had to be something else.

“Guys, we got trouble.” _I knew it! And there goes my date with Allura._ “Krolia called me just now. It seems they have picked up an anomaly on their long range scanners.”

Hunk sat up. “What anomaly?”

“An energy signature - very similar to that of the Komar. And worse, the...whatever is emitting that energy is hurtling at a high speed towards the Milky Way Galaxy. Krolia says if their calculations are correct, it is expected to fall on Earth within one varga.”

The humans in the room probably couldn’t understand a single word of their alien jargons and plunged into a cacophony of unintelligible chatter. Commander Holt raised his hand for silence. “If I remember right, isn’t Komar a dangerous experiment conducted by the Galra?”

Allura nodded her head. “Haggar and her druids had created the barbaric Komar to draw out entire Quintessence of a planet in one fell swoop. But we had destroyed it during our battle with Zarkon. Now this news...means Haggar has created another Komar? And she is going to destroy Earth with it?”

The room became quiet as everyone pondered over Allura’s question. _Yes, it has to be Haggar’s doing. Somehow, she must have come to know that we are on Earth and prepared to attack here._

“But how?!” Lance flinched at Pidge’s voice. _Can she read my mind too?_ “How did Haggar know we are on Earth? I took every precaution to cover up our trail as we traveled through outer space. There is no way she could have known we are headed here, unless...”

“Unless what, Pidge?”

“Unless someone gave her the intel regarding our location.”

Keith frowned at her surmise. “Who could have done that? Sendak?”

“Or perhaps, someone much closer.” Allura turned to Keith, her eyes inviting him for a challenge. “Acxa.”

Keith went slack-jawed at her accusation. “Look, Allura, I know you have little trust for her. But believe me, there is no way Acxa could have betrayed us to Haggar. Right now, we need to--”

“I just don’t understand why you keep on defending her, Keith.” she broke in, frustrated. “On no prior occasion has she ever been on our side or helped us in any way. Tell me, why did she suddenly decide to join our cause?”

He could feel Keith hesitating. Lance knew from his vast experience in lovebiz that Keith really liked Acxa. At the campfire, Lance saw a side of Keith he had never seen before. He looked extremely vulnerable as if he couldn’t believe she was sitting next to him and that she might leave him at any moment. Hunk had informed him privately that the two of them met inside the belly of the Weblum but beyond that, he wasn’t quite sure how or when he fell for her. As far as Lance remembered, they were always on the opposite side of the war.

Frankly, he did share Allura’s distrust for the Galra lady. He didn’t particularly like her. Every time he looked at her, he got reminded of the highkick she had landed upon his chest that left him with a broken ribcage that took two weeks to heal.

“Okay, seriously, can’t people change? She isn’t one of the ruthless Galra. She told me that she had hoped Lotor would bring unity and honor to the Galra Empire. After he failed on his promise, she decided to join our side. I don’t see any wrong in this. And you can’t deny the fact that if it had not been for her, the whole colony of your people would have been lost without any trace.”

Allura knitted her brow. _Keith has a point._ “Is Acxa still with the Blades?”

“Uh...yeah?”

“What is it?”

“Yeah, of course, she is still with the Blades.”

“Keith, you know you are really bad at lying. What is it?”

He huffed in frustration. “Come on, Allura. She is out on a mission. So, they are not able to contact her. That doesn’t mean she has left the Blades.”

“Meaning the Blades cannot reach her?”

James Griffin, who had been swinging his head back and forth between the two of them as if watching an intense tennis match, raised his index finger. “Um, what exactly is going on? Who is this Aa-ck...sa-sha—whatever...we are discussing about?”

Keith ignored him. “Allura, you read too much into this. You are rushing into conclusions without any proper information. Acxa must be somewhere with -— I don’t know, bad reception or something? That must be why she is unable to contact us.”

James signaled to Lance with his thumb and mouthed. _Is that lady his girlfriend?_ Lance shrugged and seesawed his hand. _More or less?_

“It is too much of a coincidence,” Allura ignored him too. “Haggar attacks Earth, while Acxa disappears at around the same time? What about the Alteans? Are the three of them safe?”

“Look, I know this is--”

“They are not at the Headquarters?!” She shrieked and stood up from her seat. “Where are they then?”

Keith continued nonchalantly. “I know this is hard to accept, but they were needed on her mission so they had--”

“To leave with her?” She let out a sarcastic laugh. _This isn’t gonna end well. This isn’t gonna end well! I have to stop them before the two of them go on a full-on hair pulling fight._ “How convenient! As soon as I heard Haggar didn’t kill her, I knew this was a ploy. Now your dear general would have returned to the witch and handed over the few of my people who were alive.”

Lance stood up and put a hand on her shoulder. Hunk also stood up, apparently having come to the same conclusion. “Allura, we need to focus on the Komar object that is--”

But she pushed away his hand and stomped to Keith. “What do you have to say now, huh? It was because of you that I trusted the Galra. It turned out to be the most foolish thing I have ever done in my life. Lotor! And, now this one. I will _never_ trust a Galra again!”

Lance waited with bated breath for Keith to respond. Commander Holt was asking his daughter as to who Acxa was. Pidge whispered, “Dad, you know her. You told me that the three generals had handed you over to Zarkon. She is one among them. She was piloting the cargo ship.”

“Oh, the one with the horns on her head? Okay, then why is Keith— are you guys friends now?”

Lance had forgotten about the hostage exchange, Sam for Lotor. Plus the Voltron Lions. _She was the one who handed over Sam to Zarkon? That only adds to her record of evildoings._

Keith was shaking in rage. His clenched fists and gritted teeth urged Lance to pull Allura away from there. He had always been a hothead, but after his return from the Blades to reclaim the Black Lion, he felt like a completely different guy. Earlier, Lance used to make fun of him at every chance he got and about almost everything. But now, he didn’t dare to. Not just that he had grown bigger and taller, he had become a little too ferocious as well. A little too scary... _too Galra, perhaps?_

Presently, Keith closed his eyes to calm himself. “Fine. You don’t have to trust a Galra.” His Bayard materialized in his hand. He tossed it on the table in front of him. “In turn, I don’t want to lead someone who doesn’t trust me. You may scout the Universe for a new Paladin for your Lion, Princess. I am done with your quiznacking attitude.”

Hunk rushed to block his way before he could storm off from the hall. Lance held Allura back even as she opened her mouth to probably insult him some more.

Nadia Rizavi saved the day.

“Okay, to sum up: Keith has fallen in love with some evil Galra lady. The Princess doesn’t approve of this love. So, to avenge his lady love, the Black Paladin sacrifices his Lion. How romantic!” She clasped her hands and made kissing faces at Kinkade who wisely leaned away from her.

Unfortunately, her comment didn’t sit well with Keith. “How dare you speak of her like that?” he seethed. Lance watched with trepidation as his sclera started to turn yellow and his pupils were narrowing down to slits. Even, Allura stopped arguing and grabbed his hand for support. _Holy crow, is Keith turning full Galra?_

But then, Keith closed his eyes for a count of ten. When he opened his eyes again, they had returned to normal. _Phew!_

Hunk gave Lance an excited glance. _Did you just see that! He was actually turning into Galra. How cool is that?_

He rolled his eyes. _Dude, this isn’t cool at all. This is scary. Would he go on a killing spree if he became full Galra?_

Hunk shrugged in a who-knows gesture.

Presently, Keith spoke in a calmer voice but it was still dangerously angry. “Acxa isn’t _some evil Galra lady_ as you think. Guys, please stop saying that all the Galra are evil. It isn’t true. Many of the Galra are just normal citizens like those living on Earth. Yeah, they are a warrior tribe...but that doesn’t necessarily mean that they go about annihilating everything in their path.”

“Hello? Excuse me? Are you suffering from some sort of a sudden amnesia? The Galra were the ones who were trying to destroy Earth,” Griffin spread his hands in exasperation. “They killed our Admiral. They killed Officer Shirogane. They killed hundreds of others.”

“Get your facts right, Griffin. It was Sendak and his forces who invaded the Earth.”

He huffed in annoyance. “As if Sendak isn’t Galra? Seriously, I don’t understand. Why is Keith standing up for these aliens anyways?”

“Because that so-called evil alien tribe is what makes up half of my lineage, Griffin.”

The Garrison officials plunged into another collective chatter. Griffin glanced at Lance as if looking for assurance that the guy hadn’t gone nuts. Sam tried to reason with Keith, “Keith, I understand that you are quite partial to them due to some miniscule Galra genes in you, but--”

“It isn’t miniscule genes, Commandeer Holt. I am half Galra. My mother is Galra.”

The chatter died down into an astonished silence. Everyone turned to stare wide-eyed at his revelation. For one long minute, the room was so silent that Lance could hear his own heartbeat.

Then, Griffin burst out laughing. “Your mom is Galra? Sure, my dad is Darth Vader. Leifsdottir, did you hear that? The kid in our class claims he is an alien. Whoa, this guy is a complete wacko!”

Lance expected James to get his nose broken like five years ago. But to Keith’s credit, he continued unbothered. “Yes, you heard it right. My mother is Galra. Her name is Krolia. She is with the Blade of Marmora and she served as a double agent under the fearsome warlord Ranveig until the latter’s death. Prior to that, she worked at the Zarkon’s Central Command. So, yeah, Galra blood courses through my veins. Anyone got a problem with that?”

Everyone, including Commander Holt, turned to stare at Lance, Hunk and Pidge for confirmation. The three of them nodded their heads. “The mark on his face is a Galra marking, similar to Krolia’s,” Pidge pointed to the jagged, red scar on his face that extended from his right eye to his neck. “He got it while...um, uh, in-in the middle of a tough battle.” _Nice save, Pidge!_

Commander Holt looked sincerely overwhelmed with the information. Griffin and his squad were intermittently checking the hinges of their mouths. Everyone else just forgot to blink.

Keith rolled his eyes and started to leave the room when the three of them rushed to him. _If he leaves, we can never form Voltron again. We gotta stop him._

They knew that Keith had a soft spot for Pidge, so they pushed her to the front. “Keith, please don’t leave us at this critical time,” she pleaded. “If the Komar attacks Earth, we will be powerless to stop it. Earth will be destroyed. All the innocent beings, our home...!”

Lance tried to pull Allura to join them, but she freed her hand from his grasp. “Allura, please don’t do this. We need to put aside our differences to fight together. Isn’t that how the Paladins of old bonded as a team?”

She sighed deeply but didn’t say anything. Lance continued, “We must stop the Komar before it reaches Earth. What is the time now?”

Someone answered, “Five fifty-three hours.”

Lance cursed internally. _We just wasted precious time in pointless arguments._ “Keith, please. We need you to lead us into the battle. We need Voltron.”

Hunk picked up his Black Bayard and made a big show of formally handing it over to him. Pidge joined in as well. He looked at Allura for her reaction. She scowled but silently nodded her head. Her answer was clear. _I still don’t trust the Galra, but since the fate of Earth rests in our hands, I have no choice but to join the team._

Keith picked up his Bayard from Hunk’s hand. It extended into his broadsword. “This one time, guys. After this, I am leaving Voltron for good. But now, we need to work as a team if we are to destroy the Komar. Let’s get to our Lions!”


	12. Lions' Pride

**DAY 3**

**0558 hours: Voltron**

Pidge nervously tapped her fingers over the Green Lion’s console, trying to scan for the expected hostile. The Lions stood in formation outside the Garrison grounds – Black Lion at the center, flanked by Green and Red and backed up by the Yellow and Blue Lions. She almost said it out loud that they should probably try to form Voltron before the Komar object attacks. Then, she stopped herself. _Lance is supposed to be the right hand to the leader. If he doesn’t suggest this, why should I?_

She suspected that Lance and Hunk too were in the same state of confusion as her. After all, Keith and Allura fell out due to one of the most unexpected topics. _Acxa._

Pidge had always preferred to remain indifferent on topics that didn’t concern her. Today, she couldn’t help being curious. On one hand, she agreed with the Princess. Acxa was not to be trusted. She had been Lotor’s general for a long time. She served under Haggar and even Zarkon. It was Acxa who had handed over her dad to Zarkon before they could get to him. At the Ullipa system as well as near the ruins of Daibazaal, she had mercilessly tried to kill them. Pidge could see no reason why she suddenly decided to be friendly to them.

On the other hand, she wondered why Keith trusted her so much. _Do the two of them have a history unknown to them?_ She decided not to rack her brain trying to find an answer to this question. If it was something related to math or tech, she could have tried. _Love and romantic stuff? Not my cup of tea!_

But the fact that Keith was going to leave Voltron because of this greatly disturbed her. Though she hated the idea of him piloting the Black Lion in the beginning, over the time, she had grown used to him being the Leader. True, his leadership style was quite different from that of Shiro’s. However, she felt safe with him in Black, rather than say, Lance or Hunk. Or even Allura, for that matter. _Would Keith really do what he says? From my experience, yes._

She remembered the first time she had decided to leave the team in search of Matt and Dad. Keith had yelled that without her, they couldn’t form Voltron and that she was putting the lives of two people over the lives of everyone else. Now, he was doing the same. _Why did he suddenly decide to leave the team again? Because his honor is hurt? Because Allura called him out on his Galra lineage? Because she accused Acxa of betrayal? Because he felt they didn’t trust him?_

She shook her head in frustration. She wished she could just pull out a few wires from their heads and reprogram them so that they would forget their animosity. Sadly, they weren’t the sentries from Central Command. _Humans are so difficult to figure out. Ah...but, neither of them are humans, right?_

Hunk spoke up cautiously. “Keith, shouldn’t we go into the outer space? We need to destroy the Komar before it reaches Earth, don’t we?”

“Yeah, but now we are too late,” Keith answered. “We cannot leave Earth unprotected. Let’s wait. The hostile would surely attack us. Pidge, are you picking up any energy signatures, so far?”

**0600 hours: Voltron**

Pidge was about to say no, when a large fiery meteor raced down from the atmosphere, tracing a smoky trajectory behind it.

“Guys...is-is—what we are waiting for?” stammered Hunk.

“Brace for impact!”

The meteor landed a few hundred feet away from their position and dug up a huge balloon of sand around it. “Guess so. Pidge?”

In her nervousness, Pidge had forgotten to recalibrate her system to detect the energy signatures similar to the Komar. “Keith, sorry. I am unable to detect anything...I-I just need a few minutes.”

The air started to clear around the crater. Soon, Pidge got a better view of the meteor that had landed. _A purple force field?_

The force field dropped to reveal some sort of a hammerhead mecha, constructed out of a strange silvery metal. “Um, guys? I think it isn’t a Quintessence sucking Komar. It looks more like a...Robeast.”

Allura agreed quickly. “Pidge is right. Haggar had three decaphoeebs worth of undisturbed time. I can only imagine what kind of Robeast this might be.”

In answer, the Robeast straightened up. A purple light passed through the inverted triangle on its face. It stood exactly as tall as Voltron, with a long dual bladed scythe in its right hand. However, Pidge noticed all these details later on, for then, the Robeast gave them absolutely no time to breathe.

As soon as it powered up, it raised its left hand and started to shoot continuous pellets of purple laser from its gauntlet. Keith charged forward, shooting a huge column of fire from his Lion. The Robeast was prepared for it. It lifted its sickle and rotated it anticlockwise, forming a dynamic reflective shield. _Wow, that was quite innovative!_

The result? The lasers got reflected back on them in a shower of fire. Pidge barely maneuvered her Lion out of the way, but Allura took a direct hit. “That energy spectrum completely deflected our attack!”

Keith called for a change in their battle strategy. “Lance, Pidge and Allura, attack from the front. Hunk, you and I will attack from behind. The Robeast won’t be able to defend itself from both sides.”

“Copy that.”

Apparently, the Robeast anticipated that too. _Where does Haggar even get these things? Does she order them online from the Space Mall?_

As the three of them charged in with the jaw blades, it flung them off with its sickle. When Hunk attacked from behind, it threw its weapon at him like a boomerang. Finding a snick of space, the Black Lion flew in, ready to strike with her jaw blade. And, of course...the Robeast clasped both its hands together to charge up an huge stream of purple energy. The Black Lion got drowned it and fell to the ground with a thud. The Robeast menacingly advanced to Black, with the sickle in its hand which had dramatically returned to its hand with a boomerang-return swish.

Lance and Hunk managed to draw its fire before it could attack Keith. “Keith, we got you covered! Get out of there.”

As soon as Keith joined them, the Robeast started to prepare for another attack. “Guys, we can’t take out this beast in our Lions. Atlas, we need you to hold the beast back temporarily so we have time to form Voltron. It is the only way we can beat this thing.”

Her dad’s voice came through. “Affirmative!”

“Paladins, let’s finish this fight!” 

**0630 hours: IGF Atlas**

When the Lions rose into the sky to form Voltron, the Robeast at once turned its attention toward the Atlas. Iverson reported the status of side cannons. “Sir, side cannons are fully charged.”

Commander Holt shouted his order. “Shields down! Fire!”

The creature deflected the fire right back onto the Atlas with the centrifugally formed shield from its sickle-like weapon. Even Iverson started to panic. “Sir, we lost an energy inverter on two cannons. Diverting power!”

Veronica raised the particle barrier. The Robeast was charging towards them, the sickle in its hand. Sam guessed the creature might have enough power to break through the particle barrier.

Thankfully, Voltron came to their rescue. The Red Lion shot its laser right into the creature’s face and shove it to the ground. “Thanks for covering for us, Atlas. We will take up from here.”

But Sam wasn’t ready to take any risks. “Coran, take us up to covering fire position. Iverson, once those cannons come back online, we’ll need to give Voltron some support.”

**0700 hours: Voltron**

The creature rose up from the debris to confront them even as Voltron descended to the ground some distance away. For a moment, the two robots stood pondering the other’s battle tactic.

The Robeast made the first move. It held up its weapon with both its hands. Pidge watched as its dual bladed scythe separated into two long sharp swords, one in each hand. _No way!_

Pidge did what she had gotten used to. “Keith, what do we do?!”

Keith seemed stunned into silence by the transformation of the Robeast’s weapon. _We are at a severe disadvantage now. Girl, you got any ideas?_

Green obliged. The port on her Lion started to glow at the same time Lance spoke up. “Guys, my Bayard port just opened.”

“Mine too!”

The Robeast charged in with its two swords, aiming for the Black Lion. Pidge stuck her Bayard in the port and twisted it to one-eighty degrees. Immediately, a long sword materialized in the jaws of both the Lions. _Whoa! Now we might stand a chance._

Unfortunately, the creature was much more agile in its movements than Voltron. Pidge could hardly tackle its every move with her sword. The long bout of sword-against-sword between Voltron and the Robeast went on and on. She wondered who exactly was inside the beast. _Whoever it is, their piloting skills are awesome._

That moment of distraction was enough for the creature to knock out the weapon from Green’s jaws. Lance tried to protect her but his sword too ended up on the ground. The Robeast found the chance it was looking for. It leaped upon them, ready with its swords. 

“Pidge, shield!”

However, the Voltron shield couldn’t withstand the force of the swords. They ripped apart the shield, right into the Black Lion.

A blue aura swirled over them and got sucked into the Robeast like a vacuum cleaner. It was then that Pidge realized what was happening. “Guys, the Komar,” she gasped. “This was what they picked up. The Robeast is gonna draw our Quintessence if we don’t retaliate.”

Keith sounded out of breath. “Then, we need to get up and...attack! Hunk, reverse thrusters!”

Hunk tried to pull up his Lion, but it crumbled onto the ground. “My Lion isn’t responding. What about you, Allura?”

“No, Hunk. Blue is down too.”

Pidge clenched her fists. She was not going to die here...not like this. “Guys, we need to do something. Our Lions are so close to losing power. We can’t let that happen.”

“Pidge is right,” Lance said. “The power in Red is already flickering out.”

Her Lion’s Bayard port started to glow again. _Green, the Bayard is already in the port. What should I--?_ Pidge instinctively gripped the center of the Bayard and twisted it for another ninety degrees. A sketch of a miniature energy cannon appeared on the console.

She gathered the last ounce of strength left in her and pushed the thrusters forward. The cannon blasted an intense beam of white energy into the Robeast’s face, sending it sprawling over the ground.

Then, several things happened at once. The Robeast fell back a few thousand feet, Atlas started to fire at it, her Lion lost power and Voltron collapsed to the ground.

Finally, she passed out.

**0900 hours: Voltron**

Keith felt like his head had been sliced open and thrown into a furnace. For the second time in two days, he painfully pried his eyes open to find Black completely out. He tried to recall what had happened.

But all he could think of was about Acxa. One part of his brain kept repeating on loop whatever Allura said a few hours ago. That _did_ make sense a bit though he wouldn’t admit it out loud.

Even his mom sounded quite skeptical about Acxa’s whereabouts. It felt like she was assuring herself that Acxa was truly on her mission and that she had not disappeared with the three Alteans. _Was she really planning to give up them to Haggar? Was she really deceiving us? Me? Was she a part of Haggar’s plan all this while?_

All his instincts screamed: _NO! What if she is really missing? What if she is stranded somewhere? What if she got captured? What if--?_

 _Just shut up!_ The other part of his brain screamed. _Why do you care about her so much?! She probably took advantage of you!_

With great difficulty, he gathered all parts of his mind from their own internal tussle. _Let’s focus here, now, okay?_

He groaned and tried to sit up in his seat. “Everyone, report in.”

Hunk coughed, “I-I can barely move.”

Allura answered next. “Voltron’s power levels are depleted. I have never seen anything this powerful before.”

Pidge called as the Lions slowly came back to life. “Guys, the Atlas...we need to protect it.”

Keith squinted to locate the Atlas in one corner. A huge fight must have taken place between Atlas and the Robeast while they were passed out. Now, the ship’s cannons and shield were all damaged. Worse, the creature had perched itself on the starboard side of the Atlas and stuck its sickles into it. A familiar purple aura started to engulf the Atlas and the Robeast. _It is drawing out the Quintessence from the Atlas._

“We have to do something. It’s going to destroy the Atlas.”

The Robeast rose from its perch, having devoured the ship’s entire Quintessence. The Atlas landed heavily on the ground. Presently, a portal opened on its chest and a huge sphere of purple energy started to form in front of it. 

“The creature is using our own energy to power its attack,” Pidge explained. “The Atlas cannot withstand the blast. We need to act now!”

“Anyone got any ideas?”

Keith was struck by a brilliant thought. “The heart. That is the only place on that thing that isn’t armored. We have to strike there right before it fires.”

Allura seemed doubtful. “That’s a split second window. How do we do that?”

The Bayard port on the Black Lion rose up, blinking. Simultaneously, Lance shouted, “My Bayard!”

“Team, we got one chance. Give it everything you got! Lance!”

Keith stuck his Bayard in the port and turned it in to activate. Voltron spread its Booster wings and drew its sword. He pushed forward the thrusters of the Black Lion. _Now or never!_

The creature either didn’t see them or expect them to have risen so fast after its attack. Whatever might be the case, it noticed their advance towards it too late. With the tremendous thrust from the wings, Keith pushed Voltron past the beast. By the time it turned around to fire, the sword was already thrust deep into its glowing purple heart.

The Robeast paused as if in surprise. He suddenly realized that it was going to empty out all the Quintessence it had absorbed. _That was the way Shiro got killed in the battle with Zarkon. Is this how I am going to die as well?_ He clenched his fingers around the controls, bracing for the whole impact from the blast.

A massive column of energy ripped through the beast, initially surging forward onto him. He closed his eyes at the stinging heat. But then, the majority of the energy shot backwards through its heart. The shock though enormous, lasted only for a couple of seconds.

Keith slowly opened his eyes. _I am still alive?_

He looked around. He was fine, except for the throbbing pain in his head. The Robeast lay in the same crater it had first landed, but now motionless. And they were lying around the crater in their individual Lions.

“Did we do it?” Lance ventured. “Is it dead?”

“I think so,” Keith answered. His voice sounded gravelly even to him. He felt like he was going to pass out any second. _Just a few more minutes, Keith. Once Atlas confirms that this beast is destroyed, we can have a nice long sleep. Curled up with Kosmo._ The thought of Kosmo made him smile weakly.

“Atlas, what’s your status? Atlas, are you receiving?” He paused for a moment before coming to the conclusion. “They are offline.”

**1000 hours: Voltron**

All of a sudden, the alarms on the console started to beep, indicating some anomaly. “What is that?”

Pidge hesitated before answering. “Surge indicators coming from that thing.”

“I thought it was down.”

“It is.” Hunk’s voice changed from confusion to distress. “Oh, no.”

Keith was still confused. “What?”

“It’s powering up,” Pidge answered calmly. “It must have some kind of self-destruct mechanism. According to my readings, the blast radius alone will envelope half of the Earth. And within 10 minutes.”

He took a deep breath, realizing what the calm in her voice meant. “Then we need to get it out of here.”

**1010 hours: Voltron**

His brain was replaying all the events from his life. _Dancing around our small room. Small birthday parties. Just Dad and me. His bad taste in music. Going on bike rides down our cliff. Around our desert._

Then, his recent memories rushed in like a flood. _The day Shiro took me to Galaxy Garrison. The day we found the Blue Lion. The day we had the asteroid fight. The day my blade got awakened. The day I met Acxa in the Weblum. The day I left Voltron for the first time. The day I met my mom. The day I had to fight the clone of Shiro. The day I found out that Shiro was already dead so long ago..._

He couldn’t keep his tears from flowing down his cheeks. He didn’t know if he had been a good leader or not. If he was to go by what Allura had said, then it was a big no. But he decided to do his part till the end. He had placed his Lion under the position of the creature’s heart so that he could absorb the most impact, by chance they couldn’t get away in time.

He realized one more thing as they reached the upper atmosphere of Earth. Whether he lived or died, this was going to be his last day as the Paladin of the Black Lion.

He decided to bid his team goodbye in case he never got another chance. He had considered them as his only family for a long time.

“It's been an honor to fly with you all.” His voice cracked. “Now, everyone, give it everything you've got!”

They managed to bring the Robeast high above into the outer space. Once they decided it was far enough to affect Earth, they released the creature.

Instantly, it went supernova.

A blinding light seared across his eyes.

And then, darkness. 

He felt his heart dropping.

The Black Lion was insisting that it was only because they were falling back toward the Earth. _I will protect you, Leader. You are gonna be safe._

But Keith was not sure. He didn’t want to know. More importantly, he didn’t care. _And probably, nobody would care too._

His stint as the Paladin of the Black Lion was over. All he needed now was sleep.


	13. Launch Date, Part - I

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have no idea what is there in this chapter that made it so long that I had to split it up into two. Hope you enjoy reading!

**Today...is a solemn day.**

**Today, we look back at the lives that have been lost, and the sacrifices that have been made here on Earth and across the universe.**

The Galaxy Garrison flag fluttered at half-mast. The photographs of all the fallen soldiers had been lovingly adorned with flowers and candles at the center of the stage. 

Commander Holt stood on the stage with the other senior commanders at his side. He gazed out in the field where the military caskets were placed with the flags of the Garrison draped over them. Commander Sablan was currently at the lectern, dictating the names of the brave warriors of Earth who had sacrificed their lives to save millions of others. _Admiral A. Sanda, Commander Adam W., Commander Agatha B.,..., Senior Officer Takashi Shirogane,..._

“Standby. Honor guard.”

The honor guard drew a single file, half a klick away. “Attention. Port arms.”

Sam Holt stood at attention too, but his mind bounced around, thinking about various things. More specifically, Katie and Matt.

The Paladins of Voltron stood some distance away, closer to where the civilians were gathered rather than the military troops. They were still recovering from the heinous injuries they had suffered as their Lions crashed onto Earth after the robeast went supernova.

One and a half months had passed since, but he still remembered that fateful day as clearly as today. Colleen and he went half mad in grief as they helplessly watched the Lions freefalling to Earth in a huge fireball.

The Green Lion had landed in the forests of South America. It took the Garrison nearly seven hours to pull out an unconscious Katie from the cockpit. He shuddered inwardly, remembering the extent of injuries his child had to endure. _Let’s not think about that._

He spotted her in a wheelchair, her hand raised in salute. Colleen stood at the back, one hand on her shoulder, the other on the handle.

“Ready! Aim! Fire!” The first volley of shots went off.

Lance and Hunk stood on either sides of Katie, dressed in their senior cadet uniform, their hands raised in military salute and their posture in perfect attention. For their leader, the original Paladin of the Black Lion and his close friend and colleague, Takashi Shirogane.

Allura, Romelle and Coran stood next to Colleen, wearing pink bands on their right arms, crossed over their chests. He had come to learn that pink was the color that the Alteans wore to honor their fallen.

“Ready! Aim! Fire!” The second volley of shots went off.

A few weeks back, when Katie recovered enough to sit up on her bed and talk, she had sadly informed him that the Shiro he had met after his rescue from Zarkon’s clutches wasn’t the real one. Apparently, the Galra had created a clone of the real Shiro and sent it to infiltrate their camp. The Shiro that they all knew was already dead by then, killed in Voltron’s epic battle with Zarkon.

Even more disturbing was that the clone had tried to kill them all. If it had not been for Katie, the teludav on the Castle of Lions would have exploded, destroying them as well as everything in the neighboring subsystems.

“Ready! Aim! Fire!” The third volley of shots went off.

The only Paladin not present was Keith. Commander Holt had no idea what to think of him now that he revealed himself to be half Galra. He had passed off as a human for years at the Garrison. He doubted even Shiro, who had been the closest to him, was aware of this fact while they were on Earth. _Did Keith know he was Galra or at least part alien from the beginning?_

Katie had told him that he got his Galra marking on his face after the blood duel with the clone. It had tried to kill Keith the same way it did for the others. Finally, Keith had no choice but to cut off its cyborg arm. In a life and death situation, he let his Galra genes take the upper hand to win, leaving a permanent mark on his face. _The mark of the Galra._

Commander Holt took a deep breath as the honor guard began to disperse. He wondered uneasily what all this meant and more importantly, what was in store for them for the future.

**There isn't one of us here today who hasn't experienced the tragedy of losing someone close. It truly feels like a light has gone out in our lives and the sun itself couldn't reignite it.**

“Pidgey-Pidge, look what I got for ya!”

A dark head with a headband and a pair of round glasses peeped into her room. _Nadia._

Nadia and Pidge had bonded over the past few weeks over their similar interests in what others found _nerd-y_ or _geek-y._ They had enough stuff to chat excitedly for hours. Pidge was really glad to have found a good friend among the MFE pilots.

She had spent her entire morning playing Killbot Phantasm 14 _._ The past few days had passed so quickly. And, it was nice too, to just lie in the bed, relax and order around for things to be done for you. All it required was a pouty face laced with a pinch of cuteness. She had her parents set up her entire gaming console in her comfy hospital room.

Nadia entered the room, followed by... “Oh my gosh! Nyma, Rolo and...Beezer!”

She wanted to throw herself on them, but her broken leg groaned loudly. Nyma hugged her instead, her head tendrils tickling her cheek. Beezer climbed right on top of her bed, buzzing happily and threw his cable around her for a hug.

“OMG! OMG! I can’t believe you guys are here. Dad was so worried he couldn’t contact the rebels. What about Matt? Where is he?”

Rolo shook his head. “Sorry, Pidge. Not sure about Matt’s location. He was with Captain Olia the last we heard from him.”

“Yes,” Nyma agreed. “We got to hear that you were badly injured after your battle with Sendak. We immediately informed Matt and started for Earth.”

“Hopefully, he will arrive here within a few quintants.”

Pidge sighed in disappointment. She wished Matt would hurry and come home as soon as he could. _What was he doing in outer space when all of us are here?_

Nadia bowed and flourished her hands like a magician who had a trick up her sleeve. “Mmm-hmm, so to cheer up the brave Paladin of Voltron, I have a gift.”

She opened her backpack to bring out a square box. When she turned it over, Pidge let out a whoop of joy. “Phantasm 26: Revengifiance! This is out?!”

“It came out a few days before the Galra invaded. No one was ever able to reach the end.”

“Wow, thanks, Nadia.” Pidge reverently traced her fingers over the cover. “Where did you get it?”

Nadia flicked the loose strand of hair from her face. _She is such a drama queen, I swear._ “Lance invited Allura to have dinner with his family. We went to the mall to buy her a good dress and...I found this with one of the sellers. I had to drive a really good bargain to get this, you know.”

“Allura is having a date with Lance?” Pidge wondered. _What is with all the Paladins? A lovebug bit them or something?_ “Weird.”

She waved her off. “That isn’t important. What is important now is that we plug this in and watch as I kick your butt.”

Pidge rolled her eyes. “Really? Let’s see who kicks whose butt, eh!”

So, the evening passed like that, the five of them bundled upon her bed, filling the room with Pidge’s whoops, Nyma’s gentle laughter, Rolo’s excited cheers and Nadia’s curses as she lost level after level (ha!).

**But that light, that fire, has not gone out completely. It is fueled within each of us by the memories and the love of those we've lost.**

“So...this is actually a date, isn’t it?”

After Allura recovered from her injuries, Lance had always wanted to ask her out on a date. He wanted to take her to the park near his home for a nice change.

For the past two months, his family spent half their time with him in the medbay at the Garrison. The other half, they spent in renovating their old house which was thankfully intact after the Galra invasion. By the end of last week, his family had moved back to the house. The chance he had been waiting for came today when his mom decided to hold a family dinner and he invited Allura over to have a taste of excellent Spanish cuisine.

He walked two steps forward before answering. “Well, yes. The truth is...I felt you were getting too stressed about the war and stuff. I wanted to help you to relax. A mental break, you know. Earth has some really beautiful places to visit.”

“That is very sweet of you, Lance,” she smiled softly. “I sincerely thank you.”

He shook his head and thrust his trembling hands into his pockets. “No thank-yous between friends, Allura. And if you want to rant to me about anything, I am here. If you need to share your doubts or sorrow or-or...like that--” _Ah, when did I become so bad at this? I used to shoot pickup lines at girls like a pro._ “Oh, we are here.”

They had reached a familiar padlocked gate. But beyond, Lance was shocked to see the ruins of the garden. The trees stood withered and uncared for. Broken pieces of the lamps lay strewn across the dried grass. “This place used to be so beautiful.”

Allura stepped forward to stand next to him. “It's all my fault the Galra did this to your home.”

“Why is this your fault?”

She hesitated. “I do not know. I feel— I feel that I should have done something earlier, rather than trusting Lotor and the Galra and neglecting my duties. I let you all down.”

“Allura,” Lance took her hand gently and made her sit beside him on a relatively undamaged bench outside. “This is exactly what I was saying. You hate yourself over everything that has happened. We all are in the wrong. We all blindly trusted Lotor and fell for his lies.”

She fell silent. Lance handed her a bowl of mango sundae. “This is dessert I saved up for you from my boisterous siblings. They would have gobbled up everything otherwise.”

That made her giggle softly. In the silence of the early night, her laughter felt like music to his ears. She took a small bite and moaned in pleasure. “This is amazing, Lance. Please do tell your mother that I really enjoy her delicacy.”

As she took another dainty bite of the dessert, Lance studied her. If he had not known her before, he might have thought that she was one of the fairies rumored to manifest in the park under the silvery moonlight. With her flowing white hair and dusky skin, she was simply the most gorgeous girl he had ever met in his life. Her eyes looked like precious crystals from oceans, accented by her pink Altean markings. He still couldn’t say what exactly the color of her eyes was. They seemed to glitter between shades of blue, teal, pink and violet.

She stabbed at a mango cube with her spoon. “Was I too harsh on him, Lance?”

He guessed it wasn’t the mango she was talking about, so he ventured slowly. “On whom?”

“Keith,” she sighed deeply. “I-I yelled at him that day...and now, I don’t know if I will ever have a chance to apologize.”

Lance stared at the ground. The topic of Keith lay heavy among all the Paladins. He hadn’t woken up yet, and the doctors also had kind of given up on him. “Was he serious about leaving Voltron?”

“I guess so. He was quite worked up about what you said.”

“What I said was not meant for him, Lance,” she spoke quietly. “I-I...I imagined he had got too attached to Acxa. I wanted to warn him for I didn’t want him to get his heart broken the same way I did. He seems to care for her too much.”

Lance blurted out before he could stop himself. “You aren't jealous, are you?”

It was a ridiculous idea but Allura pondered over it for long, long enough to make him feel nervous. If she had a crush on Keith, he would probably stand no chance.

“No,” she said finally. “No, I am not jealous. I just wish someone would care for me the way he cares for Acxa.”

“I do.”

Allura turned to him, surprised. _Heck, even I am surprised I said that out loud._ It was like he spoke those words on autopilot. But the second the words left his mouth, he knew it was the truth.

She took a shaky breath. “I know.” 

His voice lowered to a whisper. “But it isn’t enough?”

“I cannot. I wish I had never fallen in love with Lotor. My heart is now...just so full of pain that I feel I would be doing you a great injustice if I do accept your love. I need to clear my heart of all the residual feelings that I still might harbor for Lotor. I need to get over him if I hope to fall in love again.”

“I will wait.”

She lifted her eyes to his. Her expression was pained. “Lance, no--”

“No, let’s wait. Wait till this whole war is over. Then, once again, on a similar evening, I will ask you...and if your answer then would be the same as today, I will never ask for more, thereafter.” He slowly took her delicate hand in his. “Till then, we can continue to be good friends. You can count on me to always watch your back, Allura.”

She threw her arms around him. “I promise you as well. Wherever you go, I will protect you with my life.”

Lance slowly inhaled her exotic perfume and wrapped his arms around her slender waist. As the moonlight flitted between the broken branches of the trees casting strange shadows on the ground, he swore to the invisible spirits residing in the park. _If the need be, I will travel across the Universe for her._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> BTW, I googled the way military funerals are held, but I got only more confused. I hope the three volley salute is the correct one. Please let me know if you have any opinions about this.


	14. Launch Date, Part - II

**And now we must move forward in their names and shine that light onto a new path for future generations. Today is a solemn day, but it is also a day of hope.**

“What is that?”

“That’s the flour.”

“And this?”

“Vanilla extract...”

“Ooooh, what’s this?”

“Romelle, come on...those are eggs. Don’t tell me you have never seen an egg in your life. You have, right?”

Hunk had barricaded himself in the Galaxy Garrison kitchen to bake a large banana cake. His cooking team consisted of his mom, Shay, Romelle and his friends from Vrepit Sals’, who had come down to Earth mainly to hone their culinary skills from their legendary chef, Hunk.

Everyone was laughing at how inquisitive Romelle was: dipping her fingers in every liquid, tasting the raw ingredients and trying to read the labels on the bottles.

Finally, his mom poured the cake batter on a buttered tray and put it in the oven. “Now, we wait.”

Hunk scowled and folded his arms. “Oh, I hate waiting.”

“But waiting is the best part,” she hugged him. “It is the time we get to spend together.”

Shay climbed on top of the island beside Romelle. “Oh yes, and we should probably invite the Princess in here as well. She said she was hungry.”

Romelle glanced at her. “Allura? Where is she?”

“Coran and the Princess are helping out with the installation of the teludav on the Atlas. I think they will be able to open up a wormhole soon so that the Coalition members can reach Earth faster.”

Romelle clapped her hands. “Wow, that’s great news! Now, perhaps, Merla and the others can find their way back to Earth as well.”

_Hopefully._ Hunk didn’t want to ruin her excitement, but in his heart, he strongly felt that her friends from the colony had been lost for good.

Presently, Shay asked, “You were saying that the Earthlings bake cake for a special occasion?”

“Yeah, special occasions like birthdays, graduation day, weddings so on...you know, whenever we are happy and surrounded by family and friends.”

“Then, what about today?”

“Today is Keith’s birthday,” he answered sadly. It had been five months since the battle with the Robeast was over, but Keith was still unconscious. The doctors declared him to be stable and told them that he might wake up anytime. Hunk could only pray that Keith would not— _No, Keith is a fighter. He will never give up. Especially, not when his team needs him._ “He loved the banana cake I had baked once. So, I’m gonna bribe him. He’ll get to taste this only if he wakes up from his coma.”

Both the girls gave him a thumbs-up, something they had learnt from the Garrison kids. Just then, the oven dinged, indicating the cake was done.

**Earth is now stronger than ever and it stands as a beacon of light to help guide those fighting against tyranny and oppression.**

“Commander Holt just discovered the power source of the Robeast. It is a female Altean.”

Kolivan perched himself on the windowsill in Keith’s sickroom. Krolia sat on a chair beside the bed and gently stroked the fingers of her son, who was lying motionless. Several wires ran from his chest and head to the systems that were continuously monitoring his vitals. All his vitals seemed to be normal, but Keith had not yet regained his consciousness.

She remembered the quintant she had to inform him about the Komar energy signatures they had picked up on their long range scanners. Kolivan and the other Blades had unanimously agreed that no time should be wasted in getting to Earth immediately. Even with two hyperspace jumps, it took them two movements to reach Earth. And by then, the worst had already happened.

The Garrison officials had been horrified to see a troop of Galra warriors barging right into the medbay. But Krolia was not bothered. She had to see her baby for herself. _I have already lost so much in my life. You are most precious to me, Keith; I cannot lose you too._

She sighed deeply and turned to face Kolivan. “Is the Altean alive?”

“Alive, yes. But she is not yet awake,” Kolivan absentmindedly started braiding his hair. “Sam said she might regain her consciousness in a quintant or two.”

“And, no news from Acxa, I suppose?”

He shook his head. “It has been five phoeebs now. She has had more than enough time to finish her mission. I am afraid our bargain on her might have backfired. Or worse, the four of them might not have made it out from the mission.”

Krolia sighed again. _Everything has descended into complete chaos lately._ “But we do have some good news.”

She raised a brow. “Good news? That is rare to hear.”

“Indeed.” Kolivan gave a rough chuckle. “We have successfully struck a diplomatic chord with the surviving Galra. They have promised to lay down their arms and listen to our conditions when we call for them.”

Kolivan and the others had left for their mission three movements after their arrival on Earth. Krolia too should have joined them, but her love for Keith was clouding her rational thoughts so much that Kolivan advised her to stay back with him. “You have to be here for Keith when he wakes up.” 

Now, the Blades were back after their mission, but Keith was still not awake. Krolia felt like her emotions she had kept in check for so long were finally going to flood over. She decided to do what she did best in such situations. _Distract your mind and focus on work._ “So, where are the Galra troops centered now?”

“On Planet Ryker. It is under Warlord Lahn’s command. The planet is the safest for Galra troop mobilization for now and will possibly remain hidden from Honerva’s eyes. Ilun and Vrek— Oh, Krolia, look! He wakes!”

She turned to find her baby’s violet eyes weakly peeking from under his long eyelashes.

Kolivan got down from his perch, saying that he was going to get the doctor. Perhaps, he decided that the two of them needed some time alone.

“Mom?”

And, her reservoir of tears finally broke when she heard the voice she had feared she would never get to listen again. _Twenty-two decaphoeebs ago, when you opened your large violet eyes and tried to hold my finger with your tiny fist...and today. The two quintants of my life I realized what true happiness is._

**From here, we will spread peace, and together we will hold strong...as the Defenders of the Universe.**

“Shiro, I have failed in my promise to you.”

After they rescued Shiro from the Galra fighter, he had asked Keith: _Hey, Keith, how many times are you gonna save me before this is over?_

And he had replied: _As many times as it takes._

“I failed in my promise to you,” Keith said miserably. “I couldn’t even save you the very first time. I was too late. You-you were already dead.”

He placed the small bouquet of flowers in the alcove the Garrison had prepared for Shiro. _Sr. Officer Takashi Shirogane._

Keith learnt that the second month he had been in coma, the Garrison prepared a funeral with full military honor for Shiro as well as the other soldiers who had died in the war.

Shiro’s little corner was filled with flowers, cards and photographs. He had always been an inspiration for many other young cadets like Keith and his loss was felt by many.

One photograph caught his attention in particular. It was that of Shiro and Adam in their full Garrison uniforms, their arms flung carelessly around each other’s neck. Shiro was giving a thumbs-up to the photographer whereas Adam was laughing his heart out. Keith smiled sadly at the picture. _They look so happy in this._

He placed one of his own that Shiro had forced to take with him before leaving for the Kereberos mission. Shiro was pointing to the camera as if saying: _Keith, look over there. Say Cheese!_ A younger Keith had folded his arms and was staring at the camera with a why-am-I-even-here expression. The older him wished they had taken many more photographs that day.

Keith took a deep breath. _Shiro, I don’t know what I am gonna do now that you aren’t here with me anymore. I feel so scared._

He muttered a silent prayer for his brother before turning to leave. Krolia was waiting at the door with a large bouquet of white flowers. “Orchids. Your dad loved them.”

Keith and Kosmo stood behind Krolia as she knelt before his dad’s final resting place. She probably had plenty to tell him. After all, they had been separated for more than twenty years. Till their journey through the Quantum Abyss, she had no idea that his dad had passed away years ago.

Finally, she got up. “I wish Dad was here, Mom. He wouldn’t have to keep your identity a secret now like he had to, twenty years back.”

She nodded her head. “He is somewhere around us, Keith. He would be so proud to see how much of a gentleman and a brave warrior you have become.”

His heart soared at her compliment and urged him to try his luck. _She seems to be in a good mood today._

“Mom,” he tried. “I always wanted to ask you something.”

“Hmm, what is it?”

“Well, how did Dad trust you and love you in spite of all the evil Galra did to the Universe and knowing that you are one of them?”

She smiled knowingly as if she had expected him to ask this question someday. “Is this question related to something personal?”

_She would surely have heard about my outburst in the Garrison meeting hall._ Keith started to blush. _What was I even thinking that day? Allura was right, after all. Acxa was not to be trusted. In the end, she betrayed me._

“I am just curious. I mean, I mean--” He happened to look at Krolia’s face to find her eyebrow up in an _oh-really_ way. He sighed in defeat. _How does she always know whenever I am bluffing?_

“Well, yeah, it is about Acxa. It’s been seven months. No word from her at all. She must have rejoined with Haggar and told her all of our secrets. I am so disappointed in her. I cannot believe that I trusted her in first place.”

She patted his shoulder. “You trusted her. And now, you think she broke your trust. So, it is quite natural to feel disappointed.” 

“It isn’t only trust, Mom. I think I-I actually liked her.” _Oh quiznack, did I just say that out loud? In front of my mom?! Keith, you are in a graveyard right now. How about we dig a—okay, Keith, since we are already on this, let’s man up and confess. She is only your mom, okay? Oh no! She is my mom!_

He suddenly found his boots a lot more interesting than Krolia’s face. “I mean, I like her...Like-like _love_ kind of like, you know...what am I even saying? Of course, you know. Uh, I’m pathetic.”

His mom started to laugh at his words. “I am glad you realized your feelings for her. I was--”

“Glad? Mom?!” He pouted in exasperation. “She betrayed us, she betrayed me. Eventually, she went back to her High Priestess. I am so, so...ah!”

“Keith, you are only repeating what others fed you. What does your heart feel? Do you really believe she has deceived you?”

He contemplated over it as they walked back the way from the graveyard.

“No,” he replied with a certainty he hadn’t felt before. “I believe she is in danger. Or in some situation she isn’t able to escape. My instincts say she will return to me.”

“Then you just have to wait for her.”

“Wait? For how long? It’s already been seven months. Okay, I spent five months in coma, but even two months is too long and I have no idea when she will— oh, you are here.”

He almost tripped over a twig when he realized who was standing in front of him. She stood there in her Blade uniform, her hood pushed back to reveal that attractive face he had not seen for months but memorized so well that he instantly noticed an indistinct scar on her neck. Her hair had grown longer and rippled around her heart-shaped face, her azure eyes shone softly and her lips twitched with an awkward smile as though she was glad to be here but wasn’t sure if she was welcome.

He waved his hand in greeting. _Great, both of us excel in awkwardness._ “Hi, Acxa. I didn’t see you here.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you are still wondering, the timeline goes something like this:  
> 1.5 months after - the Garrison funeral  
> 2 months after - Lance & Allura go on date, Pidge gets her newest version of Killbot  
> 5 months after - Keith's birthday, Hunk bakes a cake, Keith finally wakes  
> 7 months after - Keith goes to pay last respect to Shiro, Adam and his dad, Acxa shows up on Earth
> 
> After- After the blast of the Robeast


	15. Author's Endnotes

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This is not a chapter update of the story, just an endnote from your overthinking and socially anxious author...

So, ‘The Last Stand’ (Part-2 of the series “All Roads Lead to...Oriande”) draws to a close here. It has been a hectic past two months and this story has woven itself as a major part of my day-to-day activities, so I am all geared up for Part-3. I think I will be able to start working on it sooner than later. 

I wish to thank all my dear readers without whom my writing would be pointless. A special mention for Guyvantic_Guyver, StoryTeller_a_fanfic_lover, ShiranaiAtsune and BrianSmith who took some time to comment on each of the chapters despite work or personal commitments. I fully enjoyed reading all of your comments, predictions and thought provoking meta. The comment count on my story has crossed 70+ which I never expected in my wildest dreams!!

Thank you, thank you, ... x infinity!! :)

Also, a huge thanks to all the others who hopefully enjoyed the chapters enough to leave kudos or a comment on one chapter that intrigued them more than the others. For new readers who might find this story at a later date, please don't hesitate to let me know your thoughts!

Moving on, I just wish to clarify a few things as per the questions raised by a particular anon reader.

**_Is this story inspired by any other series/ fanfic/ fanart?_ **

I have been reading fics on AO3 for quite some time now, but it's only recently I created an account for myself so that I too can contribute to various fandoms. So, I might not be well versed with the various terms used in here.

Well, as far as I understand, ‘inspired by another fanfic/ fanart’ is writing a fanfic derived from another fanfic or a fanfic about a fanart with the permission of the original poster. (Please feel free to correct me or add to this if I am wrong)

If this is correct, then NO. My story is not inspired by any other series, fanfic or fanart. As I have already mentioned, **this series “All Roads Lead to...Oriande” is strictly my intellectual property.** The plot of the story as well as the writing is to be solely credited to me, except for the ideas that I have taken from the canon episodes of VLD and the corresponding dialogues.

If the style or presentation of the series is similar to any other fic you find under the tags for Voltron: Legendary Defender, it is purely coincidental. It is mainly for the ease of the readers that I split up the story into three parts, rather than having one long 20+ chaptered novel. And, of course for my writing and my sanity as well. If it were one huge saga, I would be more tempted to abandon it in the middle, frightened by the growing size of the word count. 

**_Is this story based on any other series/ fanfic/ fanart?_ **

This is a straight NO.

My story is an Alternate Universe ending of VLD’s Season 7 and 8. It is purely **based on the canon episodes of the show Voltron: Legendary Defender that aired on Netflix from 2016 to 2018**.

So far, I have mostly complied with whatever was shown in canon and added some background for each character. I guess the next and the final part will be 70% of canon divergence, meaning more of my own ideas will be written rather than what was shown.

In spite of this, if you feel the need to point out something in the lines of plagiarism, you may quote those passages or plot points you feel have been copied or stolen. I will be most happy to discuss.

I just want to add here, that I really appreciate all your comments and thoughts about _my_ story. Anything ranging from an emoji to one word comment to what you liked or disliked in my story or any grammar, editing or formatting mistakes that you would like to point out, gaping plot holes, deductions, predictions, discussions about what you think what would happen ahead or about one character you liked more than the others etc., etc., I welcome all.

Except for comments that go something like: _Author XXXX has written a better story than yours/ your story is nothing compared to story YYYY._

Look, I know, there are hundreds and thousands of original authors as well as fanfic writers who write so beautifully that they can make us laugh, cry or get secondhand embarrassment for their characters in matter of seconds. I have myself bookmarked many such fics that are so excellently written that I read them again and again whenever I feel down. I may not be as good as them (though I am trying), but there is no need to rub this fact in my face. Nobody is forcing you to read my story. If you find that this isn’t your cup of tea for whatever reason, you are free to skip it and move ahead. And moreover, this is a fanfic, where the author uses up a lot time and effort to produce a work of passion. I don’t earn anything from this except a sense of satisfaction. The least you, as a reader, can do is write a comment about **my** story in the comment box.

So, that is the end of my ramble. Now onto the matter of the story for the readers who are interested in reading the next part of the series.

I sincerely wish I had started on this story way back when the world was happier and people could have enjoyed the story better. But, no one can predict anything that is gonna happen unless we go on a trip to the Quantum Abyss. Anyways, I am glad that I started on this story (better late than never) and I am really determined to give Keith and Acxa the happy ending they deserved, whatever happens. 

I guess it would require only one more multi-chaptered part to finish the story and cover the whole of what they showed in Season 8. Or rather, I should say...the next part will be where I throw the canon out of the window and write my own story as I wish?

I will be taking a break for a few days for some of my personal work. But, I think I will be able to start on the remaining part of the story in a week or two at the most.

Till then, stay safe and happy reading!! :)

Update: The final part (part 3 of the series "All Roads Lead to...Oriande") is up and posted: The End is the Beginning!


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